Relief on GAAR good for Indian investors; avoid gold investment: Jim Rogers

Commenting on the deferment of the General Anti-Avoidance Rules, or GAAR, Jim Rogers, CEO, Rogers Holdings, told NDTV Profit that a relief on the GAAR issue is good for Indian investors. He advises avoiding investment in precious metals like gold and silver for now.

Below is the complete interview. Also watch the accompanying video here.

GAAR has been deferred for one year. A lot of Indian investors are quite relieved. Do you agree?
 

It is certainly a relief for many investors and everybody will get a chance to adjust. 

Have you been following this entire coverage in India? In case you have talked to people who are interested in investing in Indian equities, what are you picking up?
 

The Indian government has been facing bureaucratic hurdles one after the other. I have told you before that India is the single worst bureaucracy in the world. It is astonishing that the Indian bureaucracy has taken up something and made it into a nightmare and then come up with more nightmares. If they want the money to come and go then they won’t have all of these insane regulations. The Indian government loves having complicated procedures. 

Yesterday were the French presidential election results. There was a clear winner. The take here is that the possibility on cutting back the austerity measures could be the trump card for most of the countries going to polls this time around, which would then translate into better cues for equity markets, which are sentiment-driven. How did you read into it?
 

People don’t like austerity, nobody does. But unfortunately, the world has to face reality. Concerns developed around Europe are going to continue. One needs to adjust to the fact that all these countries are bankrupt and they have been spending money they don’t have. The situation is going to get worse. Unless someone solves this…this is not good for the world. We are going to have huge problems in the next 2-3 years in the West and they may spill into Asia. 

 Is the commodity market a safe haven then?
 

I own all commodities. I would avoid gold and silver right now. Once the commodities correct, gold goes down, I would certainly buy more of it. As far as other commodities are concerned, like agriculture, crude, I don’t prefer buying anything right now. I would prefer to sell the euro.