JR on Wealth @ Suntec City Convention
As I arrived early for the cocktails for Jim Rogers scheduled for 6pm tonight at the Suntec City Convention Centre, I was ushered in by my friend Jimmy Shroff of Book Zone , Mumbai,who participates at the convention, into the convention hall which was full to capacity. Jim Rogers has always pulled in the crowd, being famous as a legendary commodity trader. He commands a very high speaking fee, I hear!
I was in fact just in time for his talk. Jim Rogers is an entertaining speaker, poking fun at himself, his family, his early life, culminating in his round the world trip on a motor-cycle. Half of his talk, I am already familiar with, having read him, heard him many times on television and in March in Hong Kong at another trading convention. Of course, I also did some research on Jim when I covered for Wealth,Trader’s Journal and Forex Journal Singapore in March in HK .I interviewed Jim Rogers and other master traders at the HK Show organized by Intershow of US.
Cross ref:
http://awanginvest.com/2009/07/16/1327/
For past articles, please click here
A few pointers by Jim are worth reporting here:
1. Love and be passionate on what you want in life. He told the audience to turn to gardening if they love gardening. Then they can be gardeners for Istana (our Palace) or even Buckingham Palace. One day they can start a chain of gardens and become rich from the franchise or words to that effect, since I did not take notes tonight. Jim is a commodity trader and believes in investing in anything to do with agriculture, or beneath the soil.
2.The power shift is moving to China , to the East. He reiterated his story of educating his 2 little girls in Mandarin, and that is why he chose Singapore to make his home where we are bi-lingual ie in English and our mother tongue.
3. He was very proud to relate that his two little girls were used by our government on TV to show the importance of learning Mandarin. But he qualified that he was not asked by our government to publicise this in his talk, to hoots of laughter from the audience.
4.He advised those who are too busy to have a family, to start, with their wives, girl-friends,whoever, much to the delight of the audience.
5. Between China and India, he invests in China , not in India, yet, due to the bureaucracy there. India has inherited the British bureaucracy and doing business there is too much hassle for him. When he finished saying that, Kishore, the organizer, started announcing :’ one more last question!’ to which Jim said: ‘I forgot Kishore is an Indian’. Jim had the audience in great hoots of laughter, again!
To round off, the MC announced that Jim’s birthday falls on the 17th October ( I think) or thereabouts and a surprise cake was taken up stage for him to blow his one candle while the audience sang: Happy Birthday to Jim!
The finale is an offer worth S$10,000 per person to spend one day at a retreat resort with JR at a special of less than S$400 per person for 3 days on the island of Penang, Malaysia, on November 1 2009 for up to 50 persons! The cost includes air-fares, hotel etc.
I then left my front seat to go downstairs for the cocktails, and I have no idea how many signed up for the holiday retreat to spend one full day with Jim Rogers.
I managed to catch up with Jim at cocktails, but all the VIPs invited wanted to pose with him that I too had a quick pose with him. However, my camera played up and the pix were very under-exposed.(see my wall). A little naughty, he posed holding my hand tightly that I could not help teasing him:”Are you sure your wife will not be upset?” He said:’ No’ and all around us laughed when someone said:” you could take another” referring back on his advice to start a family with whoever.
I must say Jim was not only entertaining but also sharing very insightful points about the fundamentals in the trading world, especially his leaning towards commodities. After posing with all, he has to rush off as he is flying off again tonight. This jet-setting is common with Jim that it is hard to catch him for lunch!
