你好！Good morning!

Excellencies,

Dear Colleagues of the PBC School of Finance and Co-organizers,

Dear Ladies and Gentlemen,

Dear Friends,

I am delighted to speak at the Global Finance Forum of the Tsinghua PBC School of Finance again, after 2018, when I was still lucky to participate in the event in person. However, we had the COVID attack, and as for now, I'm joining the conference online, but I very much hope that I will have the opportunity to visit Tsinghua University in the future and meet you all personally again. 

Dear friends, today, I'm going to offer you a couple of thoughts on long cycles of both economies and history. Why should we deal with these cycles? May I just start by telling you the truth: in all Asian philosophies and religions, cycles are there. Even more cycles are at the very heart of the notions of history, society, human, our nature, and economy and finance.

So why don't we start our short journey with Confucius? As always, Confucius put it: “I am not one who was born in the possession of knowledge; I am one who is fond of old wisdom and quick to seek knowledge.” So that's the reason why I would like to invoke the rich heritage of Asian philosophies and religions; because in the 21st century, (we) must learn from all the wisdom as Confucius told us, and (as) we forgot the old wisdom of cycles there.

When it comes to cycles, we should at first seek for the necessity of having cycles. In modern times, we all live in complex systems: the whole world economy is itself a complex system; global finance is a complex system; China, (the) rising star of Asia, again, is a complex system; the U.S., the incumbent world power is, again, a complex system. So we must start with the understanding of complex systems due to the very reason that we all live in complex systems.

As for all complex systems, they have, by definition, rules and laws. One of the most significant rules of all complex systems is that they have cycles. Cycles are one of the ruling patterns of history, economy, finance, human nature, and life, etc. Again, in terms of cycles, we've got short-term cycles, medium-term cycles, and long-term cycles. I would like to focus on some medium-term cycles, because they might be instrumental to the victory of all nations and economies in the 21st century.

Yes, but first of all, I would like just to come up with short-term cycles. There are short term cycles, for instance, the 7-year cycles for both good times and not-so-good times. After 2019, we started a new short-term cycle of turbulent times. We feel it. We were badly hit by the Covid, and, again, we are badly hit by some other turbulent events in the world economy.

Again, just come back to the medium-term cycles. There are some brilliant authors focusing on the two cycles. Among them are Ray Dalio--we will have him as one of the excellent speakers. But there are some other Western historians who are tempted to say that yes, they've got the 50-year cycles and the 80-year cycles.

The first one, the 50-year cycle, might be interpreted as the cycle for economy and finance, and the 80-year cycle might be looked upon as the institutional cycle. Both are very important for us to gain in the 21st century. For instance, having the 50-year cycles, we can understand the similarities between two decades: one of the most turbulent decades of the last Century-I mean the 1970s--and, all the case, the 2020s in the 21st century. At that time, just 50 years ago, we had high inflation, low GDP growth, (and) war. We had stagflation, and we had a completely new age or chapter for global finance. I would like to draw your attention to the fact that the American president Richard Nixon abolished the Bretton Woods Agreement (the Smithsonian Agreement) in 1971. It happened just about 50 years ago, and the 70s of the last century proved to be the turning point of the 20th century. And the 2020s, our decade, in the 21st century might be considered as the turning point for the whole century.

And, as we’ve got to the 80-year cycle, we can witness the sad, not so fortunate, similarities, between the 1940s and the 2020s of our 21st century. There was war at that time: in the first half of the 40s, there was hot war, the Second World War, worldwide; and in the second half of that decade, at that time, we suffered a lot from the start of the Cold War. So we have to avoid both, I mean, the similarities, to some extent, between the 1940s and the 2020s.

It is my understanding that we must seek for the recipe of success for the 21st century for both China and the world. Together we can be successful. And this is the message of history as well, because when we look at the least common multiple of the 50-year cycle and 80-year cycle, that's 400. It means that just 400 years ago, a completely new age, a complete new chapter of history, started to emerge. That was the Atlantic Age. At that time, I knew, by now we know it, a new 400 years of historical chapter was started, and all countries alongside the shores and coasts of the Atlantic at both sides, Europe and the Americans, benefited a lot from the Age of the Atlantic Ocean, by the Atlantic Age. This time, just 400 years later, we have already started the Age of Eurasia. It's blatant, it's crystal-clear, that just after 400 years, the centre of gravity, of world economy and global finance, moved from the Atlantic Age to the new Eurasian Age. I mean, from the west to Eurasia, especially to China.

So cycles are there, and just we can benefit from the old wisdom, as Confucius told us. We can benefit from the knowledge of these cycles because we must focus on the new Eurasian chapter, as what we have already started. Concerning the rhymes of history, I mean, focusing on the cycles of history, we can witness the main theme(s), the main notion(s), of all age(s).

At that time, I mean, just 400 years ago, there was a European insight for human thinking, because it was the Rrenaissance in Europe and there was the Reformation, the Religious Revolution in Europe. By now, we can witness the intellectual revolution for thinking, worldwide, globally, especially in Asia. The new notion, the new leading thought, is (to be) sustainable. We all have been seeking for the solutions of (for) long-term sustainability. In China, it has been doing very well to find the solutions for long-term sustainability.

When we look at China, at first, we find that China is the factory of the world. Just 400 years ago, England used to be one of the factories of the world, but China is now the factory of the world. But beyond that, China is the centre of clean energy. It is the centre for circular economy. So I am tempted to say that with the new thinking of our age, the new thinking of the Age of Eurasia, is in place. It is at the very heart of the economic policy thinking in China.  We can benefit from a fully autonomous car industry-it's happening in China. China by now is the biggest supply of solar panels and their components. I cannot follow the line, but my main message would be that, yes, China is the factory of the world, but by now, it is again, it is the centre of a sustainable industry, sustainable industrial products. And the new thinking of Reformation, Renaissance, is in place in China.

On behalf of a good deal of European thinkers who are very much in favour of emergence of Eurasia, I just wish you a very useful and fruitful conference, for today and for the next following events as well. Thank you.