I believe the market is thinking that there will be a series of strong 1Q06 earnings reports from that region of the world.

The South Korea KOSPI Composite Index has risen for nine consecutive trading sessions following its low of 1309.83 on 22-Mar-06. That record has not been beaten for over seven years for the KOSPI. The Index is up +5.8 pct in those 9 sessions.

While you can't argue with the bullish evidence, perhaps the short-run enthusiasm is overdone.

In any event, as long as manufacturing powerhouse countries like Korea and Japan have rapid economic growth due to their close link to China's fortunes, there will likely be continued demand for global commodities like oil, steel, copper, and so forth.

At the first sign of a shock to the price strength in these two indexes, however, which may or may not happen for some time, I would take that as a red flag to sell your positions in commodities.

I do expect to see it happen sometime in 2006. Like you I don't know when.