Kyle Bass Decries Military Retirees Funding China ‘Nightmare’
Kyle Bass Says Military Must Stop Funding China ‘Nightmare’
(Bloomberg) -- Hedge fund manager Kyle Bass is condemning a decision by a board overseeing U.S. government employees’ savings to allow investment in Chinese companies.
“Foreign entities should be forced to follow basic U.S. securities laws,” Bass, founder of Hayman Capital Management, said via email ahead of a Thursday morning briefing in Washington. Bass said that Chinese companies now raise money, in U.S. dollars, from U.S. investors without complying with Dodd-Frank regulations or submitting to audits by the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, or PCAOB.
“The fact that the U.S. Thrift Savings Plan is forcing active and retired U.S. military officers to invest into Chinese companies that build the concentration camps and the surveillance systems in Xinjiang, that build the Chinese military vessels and Chinese missile systems (building the military threat against U.S. troops) is a severe national security threat for our country,” Bass said. “Our military is funding the Orwellian nightmare that the Chinese Communist Party has created for its people. This must stop.”
The Federal Thrift Retirement Investment Board, or FRTIB, finalized its decision in a Wednesday meeting.
“Investing in emerging markets is not only legal but is the overwhelming choice of fiduciaries across industries and the choice of individual Americans,” Michael Kennedy, the FRTIB chairman, wrote in a letter to senators including Marco Rubio and Jeanne Shaheen who say the investments would undermine national security. “The board is fulfilling its role as fiduciary of a retirement plan,” Kennedy wrote.
Bass was due to speak at a briefing of the “Committee on the Present Danger: China” on Thursday with Newt Gingrich; Arizona Republican Representative Paul Gosar; Frank Gaffney, president of the Center for Security Policy; and Navy Secretary Richard Spencer, who in a Wall Street Journal op-ed said that “servicemen’s savings shouldn’t fund Russia and China.”
In October, Rubio had planned legislation to block U.S. retirement savings from investing in Chinese stocks after the FRTIB put off a decision that would add exposure to China, while Vice President Mike Pence made a speech that was seen as taking a hard stance on Hong Kong.
China-based stocks including Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., Baidu Inc. and JD.com Inc. have moved on news about potential restrictions. Alibaba rose about 0.7% in Thursday morning trading, while Baidu shed about 0.6% and JD.com was 0.4% lower.
To contact the reporter on this story: Felice Maranz in New York at fmaranz@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Catherine Larkin at clarkin4@bloomberg.net, Jennifer Bissell-Linsk
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