2024 · CNBC
CNBC Squawk Box Exclusive Interview
I was lucky enough to start Duquesne in 1981 and those were the era of Boone Pickens and Carl Icahn changing corporate governance, and just multiply that times 10X what's going on in Japan. It's an amazing situation. They've been in deflation for 20 years, not unlike Argentina, they've been through the ringer so much that they're willing to try something much more capless. It's funny I'm going over there in a couple weeks and I told the brokerage firm that's helping me arrange meetings, make sure they know I'm not an activist, and they said, oh, no, no, they really like activists. They want you over there and they really like activists. That's all you need to know, that and -- that and the fact that pricing has returned. It's a lot cheaper than here and if you believe in change, there you go. Copper is a pretty simple story, takes about 12 years, greenfield to produce copper, and you got EVs, the grid, data centers, and believe it or not munitions. These missiles all got enough copper in them and the world's getting hot that we just think the supply-demand situation is incredible for the next five or six years.KERNEN: And you'd invest in China, when? There's no -- there's never too strong a word?DRUCKENMILLER: We exited China in 2018. We haven't made a single trade in security there other than their currency once in a while, I won't say which way. I will never invest in China as long as the current leader is there.