How Taiwan Is the Alternative China

In the 60 years since Chinese nationalists moved to Taiwan, the country has grown up in a very different way from mainland China. Matthew Rivera reports from Taiwan on how culture, democracy and economics there offer an alternative China.

Source: MarketWatch, November 11, 2009.

Comments

[HaavBline:]

A good video. You can't expect much in a 4 minute video. The statement that 'Unlike China, Taiwan's people are free to travel' is quite out of date. In fact, since Taiwan started to allow mainland Chinese to travel in groups there, the mainlanders have poured in as much as the limit set by Taiwan allows. They are now a very common sight at tourist attractions, including the popular might markets shown in this video.

Nov 15 05:05 PM

[Mad Hedge F...:]

lks the Middle Kingdom is sending salvos of money raining down on that prosperous island. China Mobile (CHL), the world’s largest cell phone company, has bought 12% of Far Eastone Telecommunications (4904.Taiwan). Although a small deal, it represented the first ever direct investment from China into Taiwan. The move could trigger a takeover binge by big Chinese companies of their offshore cousins. It was only a few years ago Taiwanese businessmen suffered long prison terms for just visiting, let alone investing in China, which they have done in a major but surreptitious way for 30 years. Readers of this letter are well aware of my aggressive recommendations to buy emerging markets China and Taiwan since the beginning of the year (click here for my April recommendation) . Now you have another reason to buy both. Closer ties between China and Taiwan auger well for the stock markets of the two high growth countries. The iShares MSCI Taiwan fund ETF (EWT) at one point were up an impressive 92% from the March lows, so if you see a substantial dip it might be a good idea to double up. I guess Beijing figured out that if you can’t beat them, buy them. The proxy takeover bid is mightier than the sword.

Nov 15 06:22 PM