Wake up in the coming Shake up!
Read this or eat rats!
An eBook by Jim Mellon and Al Chalabi
Special Offer
Buy the “Wake up in the coming Shake up!” eBook and automatically get a free 1-month subscription of the Master Investor Substack.
About The eBook
Twenty years ago, Jim Mellon and Al Chalabi wrote a book “Wake Up! Survive and Prosper in the Coming Economic Turmoil”. It was a dramatic wake-up call to investors. It described the gloomy, global economy that they foresaw and even predicted the financial crash of 2008 and the recession that followed.
Jim and Al decided to write this pamphlet primarily for the visitors to the London Master Investor Show in March 2025 but also for a wider audience. They reflect on the tumultuous events of the preceding two decades and the perils that face us in these uncertain times. It is written in a conversational style which is easy to understand and offers practical advice on how to navigate the murky place we find ourselves in at this time.
You can download the book as a PDF immediately after completing your purchase.
Being a contrarian is actually very easy. The problem is being a contrarian that makes money.
– Steven Peak
What’s inside
1. Foreword by Jim Mellon
2. Foreword by Al Chalabi
3. The Challenge
4. Shake Up! The World in Trump 2.0
5. So, what to do?
6. The Golden Age of Innovation
7. G7 vs BRICS+
8. Investment Ideas
The Challenge
Don’t be fooled by rising stock markets – we are in a fraught world.
In the original Wake Up! book, we pointed to unsustainable behaviour in the world economy, particularly in the extent and imbalance of US gross debt and in the build-up of hidden leverage in the so-called financial instruments of mass destruction.
We said that this could only result in one thing – a financial crash. Sure enough, eighteen months later, Jim was in the New York offices of Bear Stearns, and the crash was unfolding all around him in real-time.
In Wake Up!, we also predicted the rise of China, which was then the world’s sixth largest economy, and is now the second. We also highlighted the likely huge increase in China’s military expenditure, which has come to pass. In the Pacific, China is a real and present threat to the former domination of the US.
We also talked of the growing inequality in incomes around the world, and this dangerously persists to this day, with political gains and losses in the world’s democracies reflecting that growing gap. We also talked about mass migration as becoming a major political issue and the effects that would have in the future.
The movement of people is one of the biggest challenges of the ages, not helped by climate change and the attendant disruptions to water supplies and other resources, including food. The irony is that the demographic trends which are so unfavourable in many parts of the world demand a need for young migrants, particularly from Africa, into the rich world to help with work in the health, caring for the elderly and service sectors. This is causing huge problems because of resentment among the populations of the recipient nations, as well as a lack of absorbative capacity. We forecast then that the ageing demographic in the West would become a major issue, and so it has come to pass. And it’s getting worse.
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About
Jim Mellon
Jim Mellon is a British entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist with a wide range of interests. Through his private investment company, Burnbrae Group, he has substantial real estate holdings in Germany, as well as strategic holdings in private and public companies listed around the world.
Jim has authored a number of books including “Juvenescence – Investing in the Age of Longevity” which marked the beginning of a rush of capital into the nascent field of ageing research. This also led to the formation of the company Juvenescence with his long-standing partners. Juvenescence is a leading biopharma company involved in the commercialisation of therapies to slow, stop and reverse ageing.
Jim authored the book “Moo’s Law” focusing on investment opportunities in the field of cellular agriculture – the production of proteins and materials directly from cells. Jim co-founded Agronomics, a London listed company which invests in a portfolio of leading companies in this sector and he is its largest investor.
About
Al Chalabi
Al Chalabi is an entrepreneur and business advisor with an impressive track record in a range of industries.
He grew up in the UK and studied Aeronautical Engineering at the University of Southampton. Al started his professional career in Canada, working as an engineer in process automation systems. After obtaining his MBA, he worked as a management consultant, specialising in technology, strategy and operations, and has been based out of Hong Kong ever since.
Since 2008, Al has been running CASP-R, a firm he founded to provide independent research and advisory services to investors and corporations, with a focus on real estate and technology. He is active in various Hong Kong-based angel investor groups that provide seed funding to Asian-based tech and healthcare companies. Al has been writing books with Jim since they first joined forces to write Wake Up! Survive and Prosper in the Coming Economic Turmoil, published at the end of 2005 (Wiley).
Al lives in Hong Kong with his partner Fiona and two children, Enzo and Margaux