In the midst of all this impenetrable talk about the credit crisis, there's a far more interesting topic looming on the horizon. It might even hit home in West Virginia. While America faces a hefty and growing trade deficit every year, all of the money we spend may be coming back in a big way.

Sovereign wealth funds, monies run and controlled by state governments in resource-rich or resource-poor nations are about to pile back into the U.S. markets. And unlike the foreign purchases of iconic American assets like Rockefeller Center years ago, this time the purchases will help make these foreign countries all the stronger as they develop into first-world powers.


While you've seen the Saudis and Abu Dhabi just this week push further into owning troubled bank Citigroup (C), the more important buys will be when developing nations like China or India make long term plays to buy resource and raw material companies here. Imagine a scenario where the Chinese government buys a major oil or even a coal company. They can afford it.

The next few decades will be about what folks are calling resource nationalism ... the sort of issues that used to result in an occasional war. As much coal for steel as West Virginia sells to Asia, what's to keep a big foreign government from throwing down a paltry few billion dollars to snap up Consol (CNX) or the newly formed Patriot Coal (PCX). In the long term, even the most expensive to operate union mines in Appalachia will seem like a bargain to someone whose national energy need is great enough.