Najcennejšia komodita 21. storočia

Len tri percenta všetkej vody na našej planéte je pitná voda a z nich len jedna tretina je pripravená na okamžité použitie. 1/6 našej populácie nemá prístup k čistej pitnej vode. S rastom globálnej populácie sa dopyt po vode bude v budúcnosti zvyšovať.

“The reason water doesn't grab all that much attention is that it’s not traded on an exchange as a commodity all by itself”, says Steve Kerch of MarketWatch. “Thank goodness, since a financial meltdown on a water exchange could make faucets, not credit, dry up”.

Another reason why investors don’t pay as much attention to water as they should is because it’s easy to assume that there’s no real shortage of the stuff. After all, about 70% of the earth’s surface is covered by oceans.

Trouble is, only 3% of the global water supply is drinkable freshwater. And of that, only a third, i.e. just 1% of the overall total, is readily available for drinking, manufacturing, agriculture and personal use. Meanwhile, on the demand side, a staggering 1 billion people, about a sixth of the planet’s headcount, already have to manage without clean drinking water. With the world’s population set to keep on growing, much more freshwater will be needed in the future.

And unless there are rapid, major strides in the development of desalination technology, i.e. making salt water fit for human consumption, water scarcity and demand will only increase. So over the medium-to-long term, investing in water supply-related stocks looks a good idea.

“Water is simply the most valuable resource of the 21st century”, says Steve Hoffman of Palisades Water Index Associates. “By most accounts the water industry is the third- or fourth-largest industry in the world, behind electricity, oil and gas, and perhaps tourism. But the value of water across a broad range of socio-economic aspects will rival oil”. In fact, earlier this year a report by the environmental group CERES warned that dwindling water supplies are a greater risk to business than the world’s oil reserves running out.

Investment opportunities in the water industry range from infrastructure suppliers to utilities – those firms that actually pump the stuff to consumers. And some of the following stocks have already generated plenty of interest.

Watch: DGW, PHO, PFW, KWINX, SVT, PNN

30.10.2009