China SignPost

China SignPost™


High-Impact China Analysis

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High-Impact China Analysis

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High-Impact China Analysis

Capture Alpha with the next winners

The old China commodity story of consistent 8% GDP growth and commodity demand growth based on fixed asset investment is dead and gone. The new commodity story is different, and much more dynamic. Even if China moves onto a slower growth trajectory, as China SignPost believes it will, it will still exert profound effects on global commodity markets.

First, even at a 4-5% annual growth rate, China is one of the two fastest growing multi-trillion dollar economies in the world. As such, the baseline numbers are now large enough that even a slower annual percentage growth rate can still yield world-class absolute commodity demand volume increases each year.

Second, many commodity classes remain poised to benefit from consumption increases that will likely come at a multiple of GDP growth. For instance, China’s protein consumption continues to climb despite a badly overtaxed land and water resource base. Similarly, China faces energy supply questions that are in many ways far more complicated than those with which the U.S. grapples.

As China’s new leadership tries to find ways to keep growth robust and clean the country up, and Chinese consumers’ tastes continue to evolve based on a host of economic and sociological factors, a whole new class of commodity winners and losers will emerge. Gaining exposure to many of the new opportunities will not be as simple as buying major mining companies’ stocks in New York or Hong Kong, and the research and due diligence burdens of making investments in the new opportunity pockets will be exponentially higher than for the “old” China plays. China SignPost’s research methods and philosophies are geared to help you capture alpha in this new environment.

As Seen On

Wall Street Journal
Oil and Gas Journal
Canadian Energy Research Institute
Foreign Policy Magazine
Wired Magazine
RAND
CNN
BBC
Bloomberg
Foreign Affairs
New York Times

The work of China SignPost founders Dr. Andrew Erickson and Mr. Gabe Collins has been cited widely in scholarly publications and reports from the U.S. government and think tanks such the Council on Foreign Relations. It is also featured in a broad range of television, radio, webcast, and Internet forums such as CNN and the BBC. Erickson and Collins are quoted extensively in numerous newspapers, magazines, and online sources, including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and Bloomberg.

Features

What's Included

Take advantage of a new type of high-impact, client-centric China research. We identify pockets of risk, value, and opportunity in a fast-paced, complex, and growing China. China SignPost works diligently to identify the trends that offer opportunity today and help you position effectively for the future.

Actionable

We provide topical, targeted, sector- and policy-specific insights.

Unique

Our creative, unorthodox research yields unique perspectives and analysis. No rehashed corporate financials or repackaged news flashes.

Where typical research can’t go

Unencumbered by traditional constraints, we take you where sell side analysts, Bloomberg, and Reuters cannot. We draw upon a wide range of data and ideas that span multiple disciplines, yielding unique research pathways that are exceedingly rare in business, academic, and policy circles focused on China.

Inside Experience

Our team has a combined 15 years of deep and diverse China experience, including commercial, government, and academic positions, successes, and accolades. This experience, skills, and perspective enables us to maintain an independent and open-minded approach throughout our analysis, extracting actionable intelligence.

About

Meet The Team

China SignPost™ 洞察中国 founders Dr. Andrew Erickson and Mr. Gabe Collins have more than a decade of combined government, academic, and private sector experience in Mandarin Chinese language-based research and analysis of Greater China. In 2010, they established China SignPost to offer greater understanding of key Chinese developments of disproportionate impact, with particular focus on natural resource, technology, industry, and trade issues.

China SignPost offers the full text of more than 75 of Dr. Erickson and Mr. Collins’ coauthored studies, with exclusive access to new reports each month. With a unique combination of breadth and depth, they go where others can’t go to deliver insights spanning a wide range of data sources, disciplines, and experiences to identify areas of risk, value, and opportunities in the world’s fastest growing multi-trillion dollar economy.

  • Dr. Andrew S. Erickson
    Co-Founder

    Dr. Andrew S. Erickson is an Associate in Research at Harvard University’s John King Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies. He serves as an expert contributor to the Wall Street Journal’s China Real Time Report and as a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Dr. Erickson is also a Professor of Strategy at the U.S. Naval War College. He has lectured extensively at government, academic, and private sector institutions throughout the United States and Asia. Dr. Erickson received his Ph.D. and M.A. in international relations and comparative politics from Princeton University. He previously worked at Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, the U.S. Consulate in Hong Kong, the U.S. Senate, and the White House. Proficient in Mandarin Chinese and Japanese, he has lived in China, Japan, and Korea. He blogs at www.andrewerickson.com.

  • Mr. Gabe B. Collins
    Co-Founder

    Mr. Gabe B. Collins is a private researcher and author of more than 100 detailed research reports. He regularly consults with clients to assess potential commodity investment opportunities. Mr. Collins’ in-depth, custom research concerning emerging markets is supported through his proprietary network of local contacts in emerging markets. His work focuses on identifying unique global opportunities for asset allocation. Mr. Collins has worked in government and as a private sector global commodity analyst and investment advisor, and subsequently as a private commodity researcher. He regularly conducts commodity and market research in Chinese, Russian, and Spanish. He is the co-founder of www.chinasignpost.com and www.chinaoiltrader.com. Gabe received his B.A. from Princeton University and his J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School.

High-Impact China Analysis

Research Reports

About China SignPost™

High-Impact China Analysis©

Contact Us

China SignPost™ aims to provide high-quality China analysis and policy recommendations in a concise, accessible form for people whose lives are being affected profoundly by China’s political, economic, and security development. We believe that by presenting practical, apolitical China insights we can help citizens around the world form holistic views that are based on facts, rather than political rhetoric driven by vested interests. We aim to foster better understanding of key Chinese developments, with particular focus on natural resource, technology, industry, and trade issues.

China SignPost™ 洞察中国 founders Dr. Andrew Erickson and Mr. Gabe Collins have more than a decade of combined government, academic, and private sector experience in Mandarin Chinese language-based research and analysis of China. Dr. Erickson is a Professor of Strategy at the U.S. Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute (CMSI) and an Associate in Research at Harvard’s John King Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies. Mr. Collins is a J.D. candidate at the University of Michigan Law School. His research focuses on commodity, security, and rule of law issues in China, Russia, and Latin America.

The positions expressed here are the authors’ personal views. They do not represent the policies or estimates of the U.S. Government or any other organization. The authors have published widely on China-related issues. An archive of their work is available at www.chinasignpost.com.

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