Jim Rogers, CEO of Rogers Holding, is interviewed in the UK and he starts off with a little dose of reality:

the recession is here. anybody who doesnt understand that should just walk out and look out into the street and they’ll see the recession. It’s here and it’s worse than the second world war. And if politicians keep bungling it, it’s going to be worse than that.

Moorad Choundhry of the Europe Arab Bank, another guest on the show, believes that the recession may not even be as bad as the ’74 recession. CEO of Aviva Investors, Paul Abberley, thinks it is a little unfair for blaming the politicians and also stands with Mr. Choundhry on the severity of the recession.

Mr. Rogers argues:

What they’re doing is the wrong thing. If you remember, in 1929 we had a stock market bubble which burst. and then we were going to have a recession and then the politicians around the world kept making mistakes and then they turned it into the great depression and the second world war.

On Armageddon Scenario:

The world’s not going to end this week, this month, this year even.

The UK doesn’t have much to sell to the world anymore… Your balance of trade is gonna continue to deteriorate.  Therefore the pound sterling is going to be under pressure. You have stupendous international and domestic debts. I dont like saying it. It’snot any fun saying it. But we have to deal with facts.

Mr. Choundhry denies pretty much every point Mr. Rogers makes. He goes as far as to say that the UK actually looks quite good as a store of the public deficit. Mr Choundhry simple doesn’t believe that the Sterling can collapse, as it has been around since the 8th century.

Mr Rogers, clearly agitated, fires back:

If you want to talk about the last 100 years, the Pound Sterling was five dollars 100 years ago. Now it’s a dollar and a half. It’s been going down for 100 years. What are you talking about?

 Rogers on nationalizing UK banks:

They should have let some people go bankrupt. Then the assets would have moved from the incompetent to the competent people. the whole system could have started over from a stronger base. What’s happening now is they’re taking assets from the competent people, giving them to the incompetent people and saying now you compete with the competent people with their own money. this is terrible economics.

Mr. Choundhry’s keynesian leanings come out, suggesting that what Mr. Rogers described is exactly the mistake that was made by Secretary Paulson when he let Lehman go under. Is this guy serious? the mistake Mr. Paulson made was not letting the rest of them go under as well!

Mr. Abberley gives us this stunning example of his financial prowess:

 “The sort of policies we’re following now are the appropriate ones…with the footnote that we’re leaving an awful lot of debt for our grand children. And we’re not doing them any favors by not taking the pain”

  Mr. Abberley, mind you, is the CEO of a financial company that manages billions. So for him, short-term gains justify the long-term fallout. so long as his investors are happy, who cares what the government does to wreck the UK for the long-term.

Mr. Rogers responds:

It’s not just your grand children. It’s your children — it’s you! Don’t you know how much debt the English government has taken on in the last 6 months and how much it’s going to take on in the next year or two. These are gigantic numbers for a country that cannot afford it right now.

At this point, Mr. Choundhry of Europe Arab Bank is actually laughing at Jim! It is a flash-back to Peter Schiff getting laughed at while he was forecasting a total collapse of the housing market in 2006. Rogers warning to the UK are eerily familiar, closely echoing Schiff’s warnings to the US in ’06.

Jim Rogers on the US Dollar and Pound Sterling:

I don’t see good things for the US Dollar or the Pound. There are many currencies in the world. I own a few others that i think are sounder. There aren’t many, if any, sound currencies left in the world. I own the Yen and expect it to keep going higher. but once this big rally in the Yen ends. then what am i going to do with my money. i don’t know.

Watch the complete interview below.

Part 1:

Part 2: