Investment guruis still not invested in India, as the market was trending upwards till recently. He believes it is about time India opens up all its markets – including currency and agriculture. In a phone conversation from Singapore with ETMarkets.com last week, Rogers, who is known for his no-nonsense style, said he did not trust any economic data of any country, especially around elections. Rogers, 76, reiterated his fear that a big bear market was in the offing. He warned that the world was missing the small signs, similar to earlier times, and these troubles could snowball into a crisis.Edited excerpts:I invested in India before Mr Modi was elected and I owned the Indian shares but then, after a few weeks seeing that he did not do much, I sold Indian shares and I have had no position in India since.Mainly because it is actually going up and I like to buy stocks when they are going down, not when they are going up.Well, mainly I am cautious about the stocks all over the world now except for a couple of places, where they are down a lot. If and when stocks all over the world go down or if and when India goes down a lot, then I would certainly re-examine India.I guess the stock market would prefer Mr Modi.At the moment I am mainly looking at Russia. In fact, I am buying shares in Russia right now. Russia is very cheap compared to markets all over the world. The main problem is stocks in much of the world are up and I prefer not to buy when things are going up and I know that there are going to be some problems in the markets in the next year or two. My hope is that when problems come to the world markets, I am smart enough to buy lots of stocks.Next time we have a bear market it is going to be the worst in my lifetime. I do not know when it is going to come but I do know we are going to have it. It has been 10 years since the American stock market had a major problem and that is the longest in American history. When the next problem comes, it is going to be the worst in my lifetime. In 2008, we had a problem of too much debt. Since 2008, debt has sky-rocketed everywhere. When we have the next bear market, it is only going to be horrible. I do not know when it is going to be.I like Russia, and agriculture. Mainly, I would like to invest in Venezuela, but then I am not allowed to because I am American. I have learned over the decades that when you have a country totally collapsing, if you invest there, you become happy after four or five years. I am not allowed to invest in Venezuela at the moment and North Korea I would love to invest in but the same applies. I am not allowed to because I am an American.I am not rushing around looking for investments right now because I am worried about what is going to happen in the world.I am buying Russian stocks today. I own Russian government bonds in roubles as well. The interest rates are very high there. So yes, I am interested in both.Crude in my view is in the process of making a complicated bottom in a few years and then it will be going up for a long time and that is because known reserves of oil all over the world are in decline, and have been in decline for some years.Oil prices are bottoming out. They have been bottoming out since 2014. It is a complicated bottom. If you look on the soft price chart you will see the bottom is going sideways for several years. They are going sideways, sideways, sideways, sideways up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down for years. So it is the best bottoms. When they turn around, they go up a lot. And we are in the process of making a bottom like that.I am not investing in US stock market because I expect problems to come in the next year or two. I am not buying shares.In the US market, some of the stocks like Apple and Google go up every day. They never go down, which is a dangerous sign in any stock markets. When you have a few stocks always going up and the movement has been concentrated and that seems to be what is happening in the US stock market.Top investment-- I guess I would say probably Chinese shares right now, or maybe Russia. I would have to go and look. I am buying more Russia as we speak. If you mean by what are the top assets I am buying, it would be Russian shares at the moment. If it is where I own the most stocks, it would probably be Russia or China.Chinese shares have come down significantly from their all-time highs. There are some companies which have problems which is good but other companies other industries in China will continue to do well, no matter what happens. Chinese agriculture is a great place to be and the pollution clean up is a great place to be. You are going to see some bankruptcies in China in the next year or two. There are some good things in China, and some are bad.Yes it will because both sides need it and they both have expectations. So yes, there is going to be some good news coming out fairly soon and we will all be happy for a while. But it will not last very long because the next time the American stock market or the economy starts having problems, Mr Trump is going to blame that on Asia and come out with more trade war not just against China but against Japan, Korea and everybody because Mr Trump in his heart thinks trade war is good. He is surrounded by people who think trade war is good. He thinks he can win a trade war. He does not know history, thinks he is smarter than history or both.I know he is thinking he is smarter than history and I doubt if he knows history. So, we will have more trade wars next year, the year after and that is why another reason the next time we have a bear market, it is going to be the worst in my lifetime.No I will just say it will be the worst in my lifetime. It has been over ten years since we had a serious bear market in the United States. I would suspect by the end of this year or next year, it will start. These things always start small, where people are not looking and then they work to the major markets and then you see them on the major news.In 2007, Iceland went bankrupt but nobody noticed or cared. Then Ireland went bankrupt, then a few weeks later, Bear Sterns went bankrupt and a few weeks later Northern Rock the English Bank went bankrupt. Then eventually Lehman brothers went bankrupt and by then, everybody knew there was a problem. But it had been there for over a year and it has always worked that way. It starts when we are not watching. It has already started. Latvia collapsed. Argentina, Venezuela, Turkey, some banks in India are having problems, Indonesia has started having problems. It has not made to evening news yet.All these markets are small but until they make it to the big markets, people do not notice.Well, I was thinking agriculture because it is down so much. Agriculture has been a disaster for decades. I am waiting for gold to go down. I have already said gold will go down a lot if the collapse comes again. It usually does and that would present a great buying opportunity. I own a lot of US dollars at the moment in anticipation of the turmoil. People look for a safe haven when there is turmoil. They think the US dollar is a safe haven. It is not, but people think it is. So it will go up.In the eventuality of a bubble, it will get overpriced. My is to sell my dollars and I might put them in gold. Gold often go down when you have market turmoil. I would sell my dollars and buy gold or maybe if agriculture gets scaled again, then I would probably swap some of the dollar to agriculture too.At the moment for me agriculture is the safest, but the safest -- and there is no such word as safe -- when you are talking about investment is the US dollar. It is still somewhat depressed. People are realising that it has strength, it has been going up for about four years now. It is still well down from it’s all-time high. I would suspect dollar will be what people think is the safest haven in the next couple of years.Modi has done some nice things. My main point is that he has done a few small things. He has not done any good big thing as far as I can think. India needs to open its markets after all these decades This is 2019, this is not 1990 and India should have opened currency markets, opened investment markets, opened markets of all kind. He is buying votes in anticipation of what is going on now. He is fine about those. As you know, he is giving special incentives to farmers. He is trying to get their votes for this election but I am not a big fan of Mr Modi. He gets great, great, great publicity all over the world and he is very well liked all over the world, but as far as the real policy is concerned, I have not seen a dramatic change yet.I do not pay much attention to economic data, especially around the elections. You probably know that all governments fudge their numbers always but especially during election period. I do not trust any government numbers most of the time and certainly not during election time. So I have no idea if these numbers are real or not. I do not trust anybody’s numbers including the US, especially the US.Any other thoughts that you would want to share with us? Any particular thought on India, Indian markets, world markets, anything that I may have missed out and you would want to share with us?Jim Rogers: I wish Mr Modi will open the market. I wish he would open the currency market, the investment markets and agriculture markets. India should be one of the great agriculture nations in the world. You have been at some time in your history. You have the weather, you have the people, you have the soil. I just wish you would open up all the markets especially agriculture, agro investments and currencies. I would love India much more if you did that.I do not vote in India, so you do not have to listen to me. But that is what I would urge whoever it is Mr Modi or anybody I do not care who it is. I just wish they will open up India finally. It is not 1990, it is 2019.