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July 28, 2015 Aritzo, Sardinia, Italy High up in the mountains of central Sardinia, it’s hard to even think about finance. The weather is perfect. Sunshine abounds. The vistas are absolutely incredible. The food is amazing. This is definitely one of the nicest places I’ve ever been. And yet it’s almost impossible to
July 21, 2015 Prague, Czech Republic I’m at a complete loss for words. I keep waiting for the deep baritone of that guy who voices all the action movie trailers to chime in. But it doesn’t come. Because this all real. I’m talking about the trailer George Clooney has just released to promote
Hanoi, Vietnam July 17, 2015 As Europe burns, Puerto Rico sinks, and China violently gyrates, it’s nice to know there are still some exciting bright spots of growth in the world. Vietnam is certainly one of them. The first thing you should know about Vietnam is that it’s a really wonderful place to
July 16, 2015 Kunming, China “The first form of culture,” wrote historian Will Durant, “is agriculture.” And he was right. When human beings discovered 10,000 years ago that the soil would provide more food than they could possibly eat, this changed everything. For the first time ever, early humans could actually work WITH
July 15, 2015 Kunming, Yunnan province, China It’s here in southwestern China’s postcard-perfect Yunnan province that the mighty Mekong River rises. From its source in a nearby mountain range, the river proceeds south, cutting its way across Southeast Asia’s fertile lands through Burma, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, and Cambodia. The Mekong is hugely important;
July 13, 2015 Yangon, Burma Have you ever walked into a restaurant and seen a table full of people staring at their phones instead of talking to the real live human beings across from them? That used to never happen in Yangon… simply because no one had mobile phones. It was actually pretty
July 10, 2015 Hong Kong Spontaneous combustion. Alien invasion. Zombie apocalypse. What do these have in common? Their likelihood is next to impossible. So why worry? This is how people tend to think about the financial system. Mentioning even the possibility, for example, that the US could default on its debt is met
July 9, 2015 Hong Kong It’s eerily befitting that at this very second, all of South China is frantically anticipating a major storm bearing down on the region. In this part of the world they call them typhoons, which comes from the Chinese ‘tai fung’, meaning ‘strong wind’. And strong they are. Here
July 9, 2015 Hong Kong Standing before the European Parliament yesterday, it took Nigel Farage just four minutes to completely destroy every argument supporting the Eurozone. A few years back when he spoke at one of our Sovereign Man events in Santiago, he anticipated everything that we’re seeing right now. Today it’s not
July 8, 2015 Manila, Philippines Thousands of years ago in Ancient Greece, it was a commonly held belief that the gods walked the earth among us humans. And that perhaps even Zeus himself might show up at your doorstep disguised as a vagabond. From this sprang the legendary sense of Greek hospitality, known
July 6, 2015 Bangkok, Thailand While all eyes were on Greece this weekend, one of the largest banks in Lithuania quietly posted an awkward announcement to its customers. Interest rates are now negative. So negative, in fact, that the bank actually has to pay interest to some of its borrowers. And the bank
July 2, 2015 Singapore When I was a kid, my friends and I used to cruise around on our Huffy bikes for hours at a time. Often we’d end up on the other side of town in unfamiliar places. No helmets. No knee pads. No reflector vests. No parents. Had I grown up
July 1, 2015 Singapore Yesterday over coffee, a friend of mine leaked the news that JP Morgan’s private banking division here in Singapore is going to start charging negative interest rates. I almost fell out of my chair. He’s a successful hedge fund manager and one of their best customers. So when he
June 30, 2015 Piraeus, Greece [Editor’s note: This letter was written by a Greek-American friend of Simon’s who is currently living near Athens.] Since my arrival into the country late May, the topic of most discussions I overhear everywhere are naturally about the debt negotiations. I’d call opinions in support or against the
June 29, 2015 Singapore It is somewhat amusing that the word ‘crisis’ originates from Ancient Greece. It’s actually a medical term; Hippocrates wrote extensively about ‘crisis’ being the key turning point in disease progression– the time at which it either overcomes the patient, or it subsides. And though the word ‘crisis’ is thrown