Shareswatch Australia

First a few personal facts. My involvement with China goes back to the early sixties as a diplomat in Hongkong where I was learning Mandarin. For a while I served as China desk officer in Canberra’s foreign affairs ministry. Then during Cultural Revolution days I finally got to China, by organizing an Australian pingpong team (over Canberra’s opposition).

Over the last few weeks most of the financial media have once again managed to draw the wrong conclusions on a range of issues from Australian dollar to the strength of the Australian economy.  Talk of the so called two speed economy seems to be back in vogue whereas I believe we should be focused on and worried by, the unbalanced nature of the Australian economy.

If you are an investor and you have not contemplated an economic slump in Australia during the next few years then in my view, you might be in for a nasty surprise. Yes the Australian economy did hold up well during the worst of global financial crisis, but the crisis isn’t over yet and it still has some sting left in it’s tail. (just ask the people of Greece!)

Sometimes it can seem like the stock market operates in a world of it’s own, totally disconnected from the real economy and the realities of world trade. However the stock market moves in cycles just like the wider economy and by understanding these cycles, investors can be better prepared for what the market will throw at them.

The world’s major stock markets have all enjoyed fairly strong rallies over the last week or so and in Australian the ASX All Ordinaries has run up around 30% since March. But there is a sense of unease amongst investors because there are still plenty of economic indicators that suggest the global economy still faces challenges.  That is because we have entered what I call the Economic Twilight Zone!