https://www.scmp.com/rss/326419/feed Anthony Rowley is a veteran journalist specialising in Asian economic and financial affairs. He was formerly Business Editor and International Finance Editor of the Hong Kong-based Far Eastern Economic Review and worked earlier on The Times newspaper in London en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley In the 1980s, then Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad launched his “Look East” policy, urging his country and others in Southeast Asia to emulate the state-led economic development models of Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, rather than those of market-dominated Western nations. China subsequently emerged as a prime example of state-led development, but Japan is now leaning again towards a more dirigiste model under the administration of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, not only in... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3352752/how-japans-new-economic-model-could-inspire-others-look-east?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3352752/how-japans-new-economic-model-could-inspire-others-look-east?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 09 May 2026 08:30:06 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Not a sudden, major crash but a series of mini-crises. That, according to some, is the prospect facing the global economy and financial system in the wake of conflict in the Middle East. But what if these mini-crises cascade into a collective collapse? And what if the Trump administration emerges as the only winner in the conflict by virtue of the fact that it has, in engineering the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, locked Europe and Asia into a desperate dependence on US oil and gas, especially... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3352013/mini-crises-sparked-iran-war-may-add-big-collapse?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3352013/mini-crises-sparked-iran-war-may-add-big-collapse?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 02 May 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Financial markets, stock markets especially, appear able to defy gravity despite the global geopolitical and economic situation. A plethora of institutional and individual explanations have been offered as to why, but most seem to miss the point. Which is, at least in part, that we have created a kind of monster in the asset management industry, which channels a glut of global savings into a limited number of investment areas and which, by virtue of these captive inflows, is able to maintain... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3351213/real-reason-stock-markets-are-still-flying-high-despite-grave-risks?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3351213/real-reason-stock-markets-are-still-flying-high-despite-grave-risks?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 25 Apr 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley East Asia’s “economic miracle” in the post-World War II period was predicated upon a number of factors, such as the region’s export-led growth model, but critically it also depended on an assured supply of capital to finance business investment. One source of such finance was bank loans, the supply and direction of which can be officially influenced by various means rather than being chiefly market-determined. Even today, bank loans account for most of the business financing in Japan, the... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3350329/why-japans-bond-moves-could-see-shift-east-asias-financing-model?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3350329/why-japans-bond-moves-could-see-shift-east-asias-financing-model?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Apr 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Can the collective wisdom or clout of the almost 200 countries that make up the membership of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) prevail against the United States and Israel, whose rash actions of declaring war on Iran have effectively declared economic war on the whole world? We may get the answers to this critical question when the two so-called Bretton Woods institutions begin their annual meetings in Washington on April 13. The week-long gatherings provide an opportunity... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3349524/can-world-bank-and-imf-leaders-rescue-global-economy-brink?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3349524/can-world-bank-and-imf-leaders-rescue-global-economy-brink?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 11 Apr 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley A century on, T.S. Eliot’s poem The Hollow Men strikes a disturbingly ominous note: This is the way the world ends / Not with a bang but a whimper. With the way things are going at present, we could be about to find out which of these endings it will be. The hope is that the Iran-centred conflagration in the Middle East will not turn into a nuclear apocalypse and that the “whimper” will be merely a cry from the depths of global economic recession. But either scenario is possible while the Trump... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3348882/can-world-markets-ride-out-rest-trumps-reign?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3348882/can-world-markets-ride-out-rest-trumps-reign?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 04 Apr 2026 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley The law of unintended consequences, a theory popularised by American sociologist Robert K Merton, has rarely been more applicable to any situation than to US President Donald Trump’s war with Iran. Those consequences will be far greater than generally imagined. Their impact will fall heavily on Asia, the world’s most energy-import-dependent region and will almost certainly hurt US ally Japan more than it will the US’ main rival, China. Indeed, China may even emerge from the crisis with an... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3348014/asia-worst-effects-trumps-war-iran-are-yet-come?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3348014/asia-worst-effects-trumps-war-iran-are-yet-come?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 28 Mar 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Before his first term as US president began in 2017, Donald Trump was probably best known for his book, The Art of the Deal. But by launching, together with Israel, a widely unpopular war on Iran, Trump has arguably dealt himself a very weak hand. There is little “art” in it. The headline splashed across the front page of the Financial Times on March 17 – “Allies reject Trump’s call for warships” (to force open the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran has partially closed after US and Israeli attacks) –... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3347250/trumps-war-uniting-world-just-not-how-he-might-have-expected?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3347250/trumps-war-uniting-world-just-not-how-he-might-have-expected?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 21 Mar 2026 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley War in the Middle East is again producing an oil shock, as was the case in past years. For the chief perpetrator of the new shock – the United States – this will be a multi-front war where the financial impact could hit the country harder than import price shocks. The US is a debtor nation on a grand scale, running as it does both current account and budget deficits and therefore being highly dependent upon foreign capital inflows. Will the Trump administration’s antics – widely perceived as... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3346308/waging-war-iran-trump-leaves-us-economy-more-vulnerable?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3346308/waging-war-iran-trump-leaves-us-economy-more-vulnerable?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 14 Mar 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley If financial markets can survive the United States’ war on Iran and Russia’s war against Ukraine, does this mean that financial crashes have become a thing of the past? Or have markets just not grasped the true nature of the current threats to the financial system? The latter is almost certainly the case, as former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein suggested when he said in a recent Financial Times interview that people had “got more complacent” about financial risks since the 2008 crisis. It is... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3345580/cause-next-global-market-crash-hiding-plain-sight?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3345580/cause-next-global-market-crash-hiding-plain-sight?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Mar 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Ahead of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s scheduled summit next month with US President Donald Trump, the message from Tokyo appears to be that the US Supreme Court decision to invalidate Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs will not affect Japan’s promised capital investment projects in the United States. That could prove a costly misstep for Japan. With the Supreme Court invalidating the legal basis for Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, countries that have concluded trade agreements with the US... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3344733/why-japan-should-push-back-trumps-investment-demands?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3344733/why-japan-should-push-back-trumps-investment-demands?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 28 Feb 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is at last showing a bit of spirit. While it might not yet be attacking the egregious economic and financial antics of US President Donald Trump, it is at least turning its attention to the fiscal foibles of Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi. This matters more now than has been the case in recent years, or even decades, because what Japan does in terms of its fiscal and monetary policy is beginning to have international repercussions. What political... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3344046/why-imf-right-press-japan-its-fiscal-risks?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3344046/why-imf-right-press-japan-its-fiscal-risks?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 21 Feb 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Is rivalry among international financial centres – such as that which has traditionally existed between Hong Kong and Singapore – becoming outdated at a time of changing global dynamics in the economic and political spheres as countries develop their own financial capabilities and rely more on domestic rather than offshore financing? Will the rapid advance of artificial intelligence (AI) into finance mean countries that do not have dedicated financial centres will not need to rely so heavily on... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3343420/how-robust-domestic-financial-markets-could-ease-era-ai-uncertainty?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3343420/how-robust-domestic-financial-markets-could-ease-era-ai-uncertainty?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 14 Feb 2026 08:30:10 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley When the world’s leading central banks rode to the rescue during the global financial crisis in 2008, they were hailed as knights in shining armour intent upon slaying the twin dragons of economic recession and deflation. Now it seems the knights are no more, to quote an old English hymn, and yet the dragons are not dead. US President Donald Trump’s nominee to head the Federal Reserve, Kevin Warsh, has expressed doubts over whether the Fed acted wisely when it became the biggest buyer of US... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3342516/trump-takaichi-meddling-finance-spells-more-turbulence-ahead?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3342516/trump-takaichi-meddling-finance-spells-more-turbulence-ahead?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Feb 2026 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Compared with the turmoil threatened by US President Donald Trump’s actions in everything from geopolitics to trade, the outcome of Japan’s parliamentary lower house election, set for February 8, may seem like small beer. Yet it could presage a great upheaval in global finance. The election outcome is widely expected to strengthen the political power base of the fiscally expansionist Japanese prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, and increase borrowing when government debt almost everywhere is already... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3341741/how-one-election-japan-could-upend-bond-markets-and-global-finance?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3341741/how-one-election-japan-could-upend-bond-markets-and-global-finance?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 31 Jan 2026 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Some weighty themes were addressed at the World Economic Forum in Davos, from the apparent return of the Monroe Doctrine and US “manifest destiny” in geopolitics, to a replay of the 19th-century “Great Game” among competing nations elsewhere. But one critical issue that did not receive sufficient attention was the prospect of a global financial system crisis undermining such monumental assumptions. These annual gatherings of the supposedly great and good, from national leaders to business barons... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3340902/distracted-davos-leaders-are-ignoring-one-critical-issue?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3340902/distracted-davos-leaders-are-ignoring-one-critical-issue?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 24 Jan 2026 08:30:12 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Amid the rising chorus of criticism of US President Donald Trump and his administration’s egregious policy actions, the voices of multilateral institutions have been sadly muted. These internationally owned and supposedly independent bodies appear to be running scared of losing their access to US funding, but the greater risk for them is a loss of credibility if they continue with this cautious approach. By contrast, the heads of a dozen or so central banks have summoned sufficient courage to... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3340012/key-voices-missing-chorus-criticism-trumps-destructive-actions?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3340012/key-voices-missing-chorus-criticism-trumps-destructive-actions?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 17 Jan 2026 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley There were plenty of fireworks in major stock markets during 2025. Wall Street plunged after US President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff barrage, only to end the year near a record high while Tokyo’s Nikkei index surged through the 50,000 mark. It is little surprise that significant developments in private equity markets in and beyond Asia went largely unnoticed. Shareholder capitalism continues to evolve outside the headlines. The pace of change is accelerating in Asia especially, not... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3339159/shareholder-capitalism-taking-asian-family-businesses-new-direction?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3339159/shareholder-capitalism-taking-asian-family-businesses-new-direction?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 10 Jan 2026 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley “Though to care we are born, yet the dullest morn often heralds in the fairest day” are lyrics from the English folk song “Hope the Hermit”. I learned to sing it in primary school at the end of World War II, and can only hope that those comforting words remain true today as we enter what looks likely to be a highly inauspicious 2026. The cry “never again” sounded more plausible 80 years ago than it does now with regard to the risk of war and an economic slump. This might seem like a gloomy... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3338468/can-world-obsessed-greed-and-power-avoid-war-2026?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3338468/can-world-obsessed-greed-and-power-avoid-war-2026?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 03 Jan 2026 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Only one thing matches the excitement, bordering on hysteria, about artificial intelligence having the potential to transform just about every aspect of our lives – and that is the exuberance AI has generated in stock markets. Yet both phenomena are coming under increasing scrutiny as we enter the new year. Some question the extent to which AI can in fact substitute for human intelligence across business and society while others challenge the technology on environmental and ethical grounds. Yet... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3337761/can-ai-deliver-economic-goods-and-high-returns-dont-count-it?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3337761/can-ai-deliver-economic-goods-and-high-returns-dont-count-it?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 27 Dec 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley An obsession with “security” can create increasing insecurity. This paradox is being amply demonstrated as advanced nations, including the United States and Japan, take or contemplate joint action aimed at bolstering economic security but which could erode global economic growth and prosperity – or even result in physical conflict. How might such threats crystallise? Strengthening security, whether economic or military, suggests increased defence spending to, for example, secure sea lanes and... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3336952/japans-economic-security-push-heralds-rising-protectionism-asia?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3336952/japans-economic-security-push-heralds-rising-protectionism-asia?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 20 Dec 2025 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley People love to hate governments, and they loathe having to pay taxes. However, from now on, we’ll have to embrace more state intervention and the need for higher taxes or else legislate a more dirigiste system of directing personal savings into investment that isn’t so dependent on markets. This can be either done preemptively or in response to the next financial crisis. It goes without saying that the former course of action is surely preferable to the trauma that will be experienced in the... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3336062/climate-change-health-global-problems-need-investors-step?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3336062/climate-change-health-global-problems-need-investors-step?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 13 Dec 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Stock prices are nervously high, bond and real estate prices are under downward pressure, cryptocurrency assets have sustained falls and global debt is at record levels. One common factor behind these coinciding and worrying trends is that much of the world is living on excess credit. Payment is now due. Another is how markets have bloated as financial systems fail to properly channel savings into good investments. This all suggests the coming correction in financial markets will be more... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3335270/inflated-asset-prices-show-markets-dont-always-know-best?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3335270/inflated-asset-prices-show-markets-dont-always-know-best?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 06 Dec 2025 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley In May 2023, Australian economist Paul Sheard published a book, The Power of Money, explaining how governments and banks create money. Things have moved on since then in the world of cryptocurrency, and it is the little understood international politics of money that need clearing up now. Public interest continues to centre upon instruments such as bitcoin and its cryptocurrency imitators, whose huge price swings attract headlines. These are not currencies, however, but “risk assets” as Sheard... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3334380/global-stablecoin-surge-highlights-overlooked-risks-crypto-finance?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3334380/global-stablecoin-surge-highlights-overlooked-risks-crypto-finance?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 29 Nov 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley It is not quite true to say that China stole the show with its strong presence at the recent Cop30 climate summit in Belem, Brazil, because the United States had already voluntarily abdicated its lead role in these events. However, the summit did underline the staying power of state versus market economies when it comes to long-term investment. The truth is that Western approaches to climate change prevention or alleviation have been half-hearted and muddled from the start. They have relied... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3333537/how-cop30-highlights-power-chinese-state-capitalism?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3333537/how-cop30-highlights-power-chinese-state-capitalism?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 22 Nov 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley A recent Financial Times front-page lead, headlined “Tech stocks suffer $1.2tn AI sell-off”, was followed a few days later by a comment elsewhere that tech stocks were the only cloud over an otherwise sunny Wall Street. Weather forecasters would be ashamed of such a simplistic assertion. Artificial intelligence and, more generally, tech stocks have become the great overarching gods that dominate the stock market firmament. To suggest they are immortal and the investment sky will remain blue even... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3332662/ai-looking-increasingly-liability-storm-coming?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3332662/ai-looking-increasingly-liability-storm-coming?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 15 Nov 2025 08:30:11 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Is the famed Asian economic miracle that endured for decades from the 1950s onwards giving way to a “doom loop” of ageing populations, consequent fiscal strains, falling output, declining consumption and sagging economic growth? Will the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) compensate for these trends or simply add to unemployment in the region? Some development experts are beginning to acknowledge that while some of these issues have been examined in depth individually, their collective... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3331798/why-asias-old-plan-dodge-middle-income-trap-wont-work-any-more?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3331798/why-asias-old-plan-dodge-middle-income-trap-wont-work-any-more?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 08 Nov 2025 12:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Political leaders like to perform on the global stage and there is no greater “performer” in this regard than US President Donald Trump, who has just been swinging across Asia, doing deals while posing as the best buddy of every national leader he met. That kind of showmanship may impress people at home and possibly win more political support, but it hijacks the need for genuine diplomacy and international cooperation in both an economic and political sense. Two cases in point are the most... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3330926/trump-asean-and-apec-are-simply-platforms-his-own-agenda?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3330926/trump-asean-and-apec-are-simply-platforms-his-own-agenda?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 01 Nov 2025 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley The overture to the next debt markets crisis has already begun to play with the collapse of two companies, First Brands and Tricolor, rattling the so-called collateralised loan obligations (CLO) market. However, with stock markets still in a Roaring Twenties mood, few investors appear to have noticed. Only when the threatened crisis reaches a crescendo will they lend an ear. By then, it may be too late to prevent an economic emergency on a par with the 2008 global debt crisis and the ensuing... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3330089/rein-loan-securitisation-another-financial-meltdown-hits?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3330089/rein-loan-securitisation-another-financial-meltdown-hits?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 25 Oct 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Are politicians dispensable, and can elite bureaucrats run a country more efficiently? The question has become one of more than academic importance in Japan, where the political situation has degenerated into chaos as potential leaders and their parties vie for power. This is a question that has considerable economic and financial as well as political significance. Japan is a key trade, investment and security partner to other leading nations in and beyond Asia and its financial markets are... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3329239/japans-political-turmoil-will-weigh-heavily-its-economy-and-beyond?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3329239/japans-political-turmoil-will-weigh-heavily-its-economy-and-beyond?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Oct 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Amid all the artificial intelligence-induced euphoria – or irrational exuberance – in stock markets and despite the unease caused by rising bond yields and falling prices, relatively little attention has been paid to the rising price of gold. The implications have potentially seismic monetary significance. Those who do see fit to comment on gold’s dramatic price increase this year – passing US$4,000 an ounce for the first time on Wednesday – tend to brush it off as a reaction to a falling US... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3328419/amid-rising-volatility-new-gold-standard-may-be-closer-we-think?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3328419/amid-rising-volatility-new-gold-standard-may-be-closer-we-think?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 11 Oct 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley It is tempting to think that the global economy has become immune to shocks despite multiple ongoing physical conflicts, trade wars and other trauma that have characterised the Donald Trump era. Growth has continued, after all, albeit at a reduced pace, and financial markets are still riding high. This apparent economic resilience comes at a high cost, however. This growth is being “bought” by borrowing on a grand scale by governments, companies and households in both advanced and emerging... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3327660/why-cost-buying-economic-growth-destined-rise?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3327660/why-cost-buying-economic-growth-destined-rise?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 04 Oct 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley The tsunami of liquidity washing through financial markets now threatens to drown us all in a destructive wave. Markets are not directing this excess liquidity in any meaningful way. That much is obvious from their antics in recent days. It seems that stock markets from New York to Tokyo have been going wild in anticipation of increased financial liquidity on the back of the US Federal Reserve’s decision to cut rates slightly, while long-term bond markets are signalling a retreat that could... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3325992/beware-rising-bond-yields-and-falling-markets?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3325992/beware-rising-bond-yields-and-falling-markets?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 20 Sep 2025 08:30:10 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley At a time when cryptocurrencies are being promoted aggressively by none other than US President Donald Trump, among others, it is significant that the price of gold is leaping to record highs nearly every day. It is arguably even more significant that one leading cryptocurrency group, Tether, is investing heavily in gold, the same metal that cryptocurrency aspires to replace and which economist John Maynard Keynes once described as a “barbarous relic”. These developments are symptomatic of... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3325295/crypto-vs-gold-struggle-new-battle-lines-are-being-drawn?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3325295/crypto-vs-gold-struggle-new-battle-lines-are-being-drawn?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 13 Sep 2025 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley This time, it was not America’s Franklin D. Roosevelt, Britain’s Winston Churchill and the Soviet Union’s Joseph Stalin meeting in the Crimean city of Yalta to carve up a defeated Germany and reshape the post-war European order. Instead, it was China’s Xi Jinping, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and India’s Narendra Modi at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in the Chinese city of Tianjin to consider the implications of a new and non-US-dominated global order. It was a historic occasion... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3324344/shanghai-spirit-new-world-order-needs-be-matched-west?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3324344/shanghai-spirit-new-world-order-needs-be-matched-west?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 06 Sep 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley How do we know when a stock market boom is about to end in a bust, or when an asset bubble is about to burst? There is little point in looking to market practitioners or analysts for objective answers as they are generally too anxious to preserve their market-linked bonuses. But what about economists – at least those who either still work in academia or for multilateral institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, rather than investment banks? Surely those who have no vested interest in... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3323518/stock-prices-are-bubble-heights-whos-sounding-alarm?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3323518/stock-prices-are-bubble-heights-whos-sounding-alarm?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 30 Aug 2025 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Global headlines continue to be dominated by wars, both of the physical kind characterised by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s siege of Gaza, as well as trade wars such as those provoked by US President Donald Trump’s tariffs. It is perhaps no surprise, then, that the resurgence of infrastructure wars has attracted relatively little international attention. And yet Japan’s relaunch of a major land and maritime infrastructure initiative spanning East Asia, Africa, India and the Middle... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3322677/why-japan-should-cooperate-china-infrastructure-not-compete?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3322677/why-japan-should-cooperate-china-infrastructure-not-compete?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 23 Aug 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Earlier this month, the White House announced that US President Donald Trump had signed an executive order “to allow 401(k) investors to access alternative assets for better returns and diversification”. Aside from perhaps property tycoons and tech barons, few have reason to applaud this move, which allows retirement fund investors to access risky financial assets such as cryptocurrencies and real estate. Setting aside for a moment the fact that Trump or members of his family have vested... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3321836/who-gains-most-trumps-retirement-fund-reforms?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3321836/who-gains-most-trumps-retirement-fund-reforms?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 16 Aug 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley There is an old joke that economic commentators have predicted nine out of the past five recessions. The implication is that they engage in doom-mongering while other people get on with real life. This is an exaggeration, and there are good reasons to heed “the boy who cried wolf”. The financial world appears to be basking in the idea that US President Donald Trump’s tariffs have fallen short of sparking a global trade war. Stock markets are riding high, bond markets are jittery but hardly... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3321116/why-world-must-heed-boy-crying-wolf-over-risk-financial-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3321116/why-world-must-heed-boy-crying-wolf-over-risk-financial-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 09 Aug 2025 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley The law has emerged as a powerful weapon in the war on global warming, with a series of landmark judgments seeking to make governments legally responsible for limiting greenhouse gas emissions arising from the use of fossil fuels. This move is one of the strongest yet in the fight against the existential threat of climate change, but it raises the question of who will pay for necessary remedial actions. Until now, the world’s approach to battling global warming has been largely passive. It has... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3320298/why-force-law-worlds-best-hope-beating-climate-change?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3320298/why-force-law-worlds-best-hope-beating-climate-change?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 02 Aug 2025 08:30:09 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley The time has come to cease speculating over whether we are due for another stock market crash – it’s almost certain that we are. Instead, we should give serious thought to the need for fundamental change in the way savings are collected and invested in crash-prone market economies. Where does safety lie? The answer to this excellent question is that the only way to avoid another systemic financial crisis – in equity markets especially – is through systemic reforms. There is something almost... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3319463/economies-are-left-looking-safety-animal-spirits-run-wild?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3319463/economies-are-left-looking-safety-animal-spirits-run-wild?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 26 Jul 2025 21:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley All Quiet on the Western Front was the title of the classic novel about the first world war, written by Erich Maria Remarque. To me, the book pretty closely describes the current situation in Western financial markets. But is it now, as it was then, a case of the calm before the storm? For the answer, we can turn to the work of another writer, William Butler Yeats. In his poem, The Second Coming, he penned the lines, “Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosed upon the... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3318544/things-fall-apart-world-why-arent-investors-worried?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3318544/things-fall-apart-world-why-arent-investors-worried?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 19 Jul 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley What good are bricks without mortar? For that matter, what good is the Brics bloc of developing and emerging nations without a strong bonding force that enables its members to jointly construct a new global political and economic order? This question arose again after the news of President Xi Jinping’s absence from the latest Brics summit in Rio de Janeiro, with Prime Minister Li Qiang attending in his place. Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3317727/brics-still-lacking-cement-build-better-structure?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3317727/brics-still-lacking-cement-build-better-structure?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 12 Jul 2025 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley With a few honourable exceptions, such as in the cases of Japan and China, political and business leaders seem desperate to appease US President Donald Trump over his many trade demands. More worrying is that multilateral financial institutions also seem to be running scared of his bullying tactics. From the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank downwards – or perhaps “outwards” would be a better term – these institutions appear to be falling down on the job when it comes to... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3316816/multilateral-banks-must-raise-alarm-trumps-actions-more-clearly?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3316816/multilateral-banks-must-raise-alarm-trumps-actions-more-clearly?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 05 Jul 2025 08:30:10 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Why are central banks, including those of China and India, adding gold bullion to their reserves at an almost alarming rate, to the point where gold is now second only to the US dollar as an official reserve asset? It is not for the same reason that others are snatching up the yellow metal, which is to act as a hedge against inflation or stagflation. Central banks have instead joined the gold rush because they fear financial crises occurring, simultaneously and on multiple fronts, and these... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3315943/central-banks-rush-gold-fears-us-dollar-crisis-mount?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3315943/central-banks-rush-gold-fears-us-dollar-crisis-mount?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 28 Jun 2025 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley “It’s an ill wind that blows nobody any good,” to quote a centuries-old proverb. It is one that could be applied now with justification to the ill winds sweeping across the Pacific from US President Donald Trump’s America to Asia. These disruptive currents are creating geopolitical turbulence, economic disruption and financial instability. However, the opportunity they present for Asia to challenge the post-war economic order and reshape its own destiny has received less attention. Among the... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3315080/truly-asian-economic-bloc-can-asia-succeed-where-it-failed?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/asia-opinion/article/3315080/truly-asian-economic-bloc-can-asia-succeed-where-it-failed?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 21 Jun 2025 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley Fashionable, frivolous or downright foolish? Which of these words best describes the trend in markets toward derivatives, cryptocurrencies, digital assets and tokens as supplements or alternatives to traditional finance? Where is this great “paper chase” leading? For one thing, it is likely to be causing a flight into gold. But unless gold is remonetised and mining output is stepped up sharply, that trend could lead to deflation and limited economic growth. So a retreat to sustainable safety... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3314109/how-obsession-risky-assets-putting-global-finance-peril?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3314109/how-obsession-risky-assets-putting-global-finance-peril?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 14 Jun 2025 08:30:07 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley China has powered ahead of other nations in terms of industrial and export development, to the point where it is now seen by rivals (not least the US) as a threat that must be countered by trade protectionism. But most analyses of its success overlook the key role played by China’s financial system. The mirror image of that success is the failure by many Western economies to nurture savings collections and investment systems that are well attuned to promoting balanced economic growth. Fund... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3313234/how-chinas-overlooked-financial-system-enabled-its-industrial-success?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3313234/how-chinas-overlooked-financial-system-enabled-its-industrial-success?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 07 Jun 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley US President Donald Trump is an enigma. He has correctly identified the two most unsustainable elements of the global economic order, but his attempts to bring about their creative destruction threaten disaster. Has he perhaps revealed a paradoxical truth that such destruction is the only practical way to go? It was never going to be possible for the United States to remain the “consumer of last resort” indefinitely, thereby allowing other economies to pursue unsustainable export-led growth. It... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3312287/how-save-world-economy-and-make-trump-think-it-was-his-doing?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3312287/how-save-world-economy-and-make-trump-think-it-was-his-doing?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 31 May 2025 08:30:08 +0000 Anthony Rowley Anthony Rowley For all of US President Donald Trump’s public bellicosity, it is money that talks – more softly but more powerfully, and with greater impact. This is the lesson Trump needs to learn as investors, especially those in Asia, vote with their feet and beat a retreat from US financial markets. The clearest sign of the severity of that retreat is not the immediate shocks administered to US stock prices by Trump’s rantings on tariffs and trade. Rather, it is visible in the longer-term developments in... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3311385/money-talks-and-trump-should-pay-attention-asias-bond-markets?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/world-opinion/article/3311385/money-talks-and-trump-should-pay-attention-asias-bond-markets?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 24 May 2025 08:30:07 +0000