Today’s Iraq may well be the world’s purest form of value investing. Virtually every company in every industry is struggling. Struggling to grow and to restructure itself. The entire country is effectively a turn-around situation.
And at the same time, Iraq has 20% of the world’s oil reserves. So the value is already there, amidst a sea of restructuring and uncertainty. And finally there is the emotional aspect. Iraq evokes a particularly strong emotional reaction from virtually everyone – whether they be Western or Middle Eastern.
Overall, it would be difficult to find a more stark example of the collision of emotion, uncertainty and economic value than in today’s Iraq. And this makes it a fascinating topic for value investors – who have always lived at this particular intersection.
Cross-Border Investment Trends to Watch For
An interview with Peter Williamson of Cambridge University Judge School of Business
Value investors have long been obsessed with trends. The secular ones can provide a measure of certainty and the cyclical ones can provide buying opportunities. It’s a useful obsession.
One of the advantages of global value investing is that one can study not only domestic trends (such as consumer demographics) but also cross-border trends. The increasing collisions of developed and developing economies. Such as how the increasing interactions playing out on their common border. Or how suddenly wealthy Indian businesses can change the private market value of certain European companies. And so on. There is constantly evolving patchwork of such cross-border trends and interactions.
