Word: cheap
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...this situation isn't all bad. The dollar is now low enough to make the U.S. a cheap place in which to travel, do business and buy things. Americans visiting Europe or the U.K. know an expensive currency when they see one. New Yorkers returning from London say the prices there look almost the same as in New York, except they are quoted in British pounds, which are now worth more than $2 each. I learned of a delegation of wealthy Chinese entrepreneurs who on a recent visit to America insisted on going to discount malls to buy designer goods...
Instead, Dodge & Cox believes the more vantage points there are the better. On the stocks side, 20 analysts track companies, waiting for chances to buy solid, long-term businesses on the cheap--a classic value-investor stance. When an analyst thinks a company is something Dodge & Cox would be well advised to hold for five years, the analyst makes the case to an investment-policy committee...
That something is the close of a remarkable era of easy money. Cheap credit helped fuel the stock bubble at the end of the past millennium and almost entirely fueled the real estate boom of the first years of this millennium. It kept us spending through the tough years that followed the stock market's collapse, and it allowed the Bush Administration to finance big budget deficits without strain. Easy money also helped enable the rise of private equity as a major economic force...
...though, there's certainly no shortage of buyer interest. Indonesian artists may not yet be selling in the hundreds of thousands of dollars-but that, say experts, is the point. "Now is the time to jump in," suggests Iskandar from Christie's. "Indonesian art is so cheap you can't lose on it." It's the kind of advice any collector loves to hear...
...more. Asia has not only repaired much of the damage but taken out insurance-perhaps too much insurance-against a similar accident. During the 1990s Asian countries borrowed and spent beyond their means, a spree fueled by economic liberalization, overvalued local currencies and a flood of cheap foreign investment. But liberalization was badly executed, with political cronies running roughshod over regulators. Companies and consumers borrowed too much, much of it in foreign currencies. When Thailand's central bank ran out of foreign exchange and had to let the baht plunge, other currencies fell as investors lost confidence. There...