Investing in Asian markets‪.‬ Finance & Fury Podcast

Welcome to Finance and Fury.
This episode on about how to invest in Asian markets and how to avoid some of the biggest pitfalls in these markets – I have covered the Aus market, and the US market in detail, but haven’t covered much on a giant portion of investments that are available – that is Asian markets
Why would you want to invest? Number of people in this region is around 4 to 4.5 billion people – or over 50% of the world population Along with this – comes the companies that provides goods and services to these individuals Has the potential for market returns – how? Companies performances are based off supply and demand - Diversification – considered emerging markets – has growth potential that isn’t as correlated to issues in the west  
Countries – and their respective markets – go through the list – some of the market caps may be a little old - hard to get up to the minute data on these
Tokyo Stock Exchange – Japan - June 2020, the exchange had over 3,700 listed companies, with a combined market capitalization of greater than $5.6 trillion Shanghai Stock Exchange – China – around $6.72 trillion – maybe around 1,200 companies (hard to get estimates) Shenzhen Stock Exchange – China - $3 trillion market cap - maybe around 1,700 companies (hard to get estimates) Other nations close to China – HK, Taiwan
Hong Kong Stock Exchange – Hongkong - Market capitalisation was $6.5 trillion at the end of December 2020 – 2,600 shares Makes sense that this is around the same size as the Chinese markets – go through why in a minute Taiwan Exchange – Taiwan – $1.5 trillion, 900 listed companies Singapore Exchange – Singapore - $650 billion – 700 listed companies Bombay Stock Exchange – India - $2.5 trillion market cap, with 5,500 listed companies National Stock Exchange – India - $2.5 trillion, 2,000 listed companies Korea Exchange - South Korea - $2.1 trillion market cap, with 2,400 listed companies The Stock Exchange of Thailand – Thailand - $500 billion, 600 listed companies Indonesia Stock Exchange – Indonesia, Jakarta - $600 billion, 700 listed companies  
These have been some of the bigger ones – there are plenty more – but in the interest of time – move on
But in total – out of these markets – there is a market cap of just under $32 trillion and 22,000 listed companies available for purchase – As comparison - Australia’s market cap is around $1.6 trillion USD, with around 2,400 listed companies – so these Asian markets have a market cap around 20 times larger and 9 times the number of companies Some of the growth potentials over the past few decades may look huge as well - China – probably one of the biggest rises in economic growth and wealth in human history – opening up their free markets – anyone would be crazy to not invest in the Chinese market, right?  
However – it isn’t all rosy – Within the Asian markets – there can be many pitfalls – to start with – China is a good example – and how companies that surround China can also be filled with landmines of companies – to start with – a simple explanation of the problem would be to say that China’s listing process on the exchange is over regulated and then beyond this, it is not regulated enough – that is where out of all the markets mentioned above – china stands out for one major reason
Stock exchanges around the world are mostly non-government companies – they are a market place provider – exchange in shares – Think of these companies as a service providing company – allowing you to buy and sell shares through an exchange – brokerage accounts allow for the transactions to take place – but the exchange itself allows for market pricing – where all brokers, i.e. buyers and sellers can come together As an example – the New York stock exchange, or the ASX – all regular companies – all ironically listed on their re