00:00Let's start off with obviously the biggest macro risk at the moment and the geopolitical risk,
00:04which is this ongoing uncertainty over the war and over what happens to the Strait of Hormuz,
00:09where the US naval blockade is still implemented. How do you see the impact ongoing for Asia?
00:16Because just a day or so ago, markets were really pretty optimistic that we were going to see a
00:22reopening of flows through the Strait. Yeah, so basically the markets want to push Trump and
00:30Trump will have to concede, in my view, because anything that goes beyond two months, and we're
00:36very close to that, it is going to be extremely disruptive. We had, of course, the world economic
00:42outlook from the fund, and that's a very minor impact only because they are assuming that the
00:49world will be over in the next few days. So, you know, in a way, the market is telling Trump
00:54what
00:54to do, and I don't think Trump is going to avoid this end to the war because there's basically no
01:02choice. Otherwise, we would have a massive recession globally, and therefore, I think the markets are
01:07going to be right. Where do you think the biggest scarring is going to be? Of course, it depends on
01:14when this conflict ends and, you know, when we do see normal flows being restored when it comes to
01:20passage through the Strait of Hormuz. But obviously, China has been fairly resilient in this environment.
01:27Where do you see the biggest damage and, I guess, the biggest beneficiaries in Asia?
01:32Well, clearly, Southeast Asia, Thailand, Philippines, you know, countries that not only depend on the
01:38Strait of Hormuz, but also depend on refineries elsewhere. So I think what we're going to see is
01:45everybody emulating China, so self-reliance across the board. We're going to see a lot of stockpiling,
01:50and this is why I actually think that oil prices are not going to come down as much as probably
01:56expected, because everybody's going to say this might happen again. And the end of the world will not
02:02be so clear. So indeed, it might happen again. They have a point in stockpiling. So for that reason,
02:10I think whoever doesn't have refineries, and there's a lot of Southeast Asian countries out there,
02:15including India, by the way, beyond Southeast Asia, they will stockpile and they will build
02:20more refineries. So there will be a push for refinery capacity in Asia beyond China now, and in
02:28second order South Korea and Japan. Yeah.
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