Too Many China Experts

On Fast Money this evening, Melissa Lee was sitting in for Dylan Rattigan. Lee, to her credit, has done some of the most interesting reporting on economic developments in China and the only reporting on CNBC that shows any depth on the topic.

Around the middle of the show, she asked her panelists, who tonight included Jon Najarian (the options expert), Pete Najarian (the other options expert), Joe Terranova (the commodity expert) and Guy Adami (who is clearly not a expert) whether the Chinese market would move forward now that the Olympics are over. What ensued was the most nonsensical, amateurish discussion on China to have occurred in modern time.

Jon Najarian basically said that he likes the FXI (the Chinese market index traded on the US) because it is down 60% year to date, but still up two fold over the last two years so that the trend is intact. Joe Terranova said that the dry shippers are the place that you want to be if China presses the start button and that the dry shippers exploded higher from August to October last year so that if China presses the button again, that is the sector that you want to buy. (He seemed especially fascinated by the term button, as it related to Chinese growth - everything is dependent on this button). At this point, Melissa Lee asked what about the global slowdown and who would be buying Chinese products in the current environment.

After a little waffling, Jon Najarian then saw the opportunity to take the stage back and say that, as a result of the Olympics, billions of Chinese had now tasted the good life that the West enjoys and would be purchasers. What was most unusual was that this time when Jon took the stage, he clearly indicated that he had never been to China, and that he didn't believe that anybody else on the "expert" panel had been there (he said, "Melissa, as you know since you have been there..").

If you ever wonder how little the Fast Money guys really know, try to get your hands on a copy of this exchange. It is very telling.

To Guy Adami's credit, he largely stayed out of this discussion. He was already wrong on China more times than the law allows, having gone on the record numerous times over the last several years saying that there is no way that China could ever slow before the Olympics.