JOHANNESBURG – Step away from the crowd, look, see what no-one else is noticing – and that is where you can find what everyone is searching for.

This is Jim Rogers' key to success. He should know, he is a US dollar billionaire, one of the world's foremost financial analysts and commentators and an author.

Rogers is increasingly bullish about investing across Africa and emerging markets.

Rogers, 74, has investments in many countries. One of his most recent is into a Hong Kong-listed coal mine in Indonesia.

He was scoffed at, while the rest of the world is moving away from fossil-fuels, that one of the world's most savvy investment seers had bought into a coal mine.

In typical Rogers fashion, he had his finger on the pulse. His reckoning is that there will still be a need for coal.

It will take many decades for the world to run completely on renewable energy. He is also on record saying that he invests in "good coal" which is less harmful.

In an interview with the South China Morning Post, owned by Jack Ma, founder and executive chairperson of Alibaba Group, he is quoted as saying coal has a potential upside in the age of clean energy.

"All coal is bad to the public and to the press, which is not correct," he said. "All coal can be clean, even though it may be expensive you put in the time, effort and money to make it better."

Rogers graduated from Yale, with a BA in history and a degree in philosophy, politics and economics from Oxford University. He and one of the world's most wealthiest men, George Soros, co-founded the Quantum Fund in 1970. They worked together for a decade, making sure the fund's value increased by 40 times.

Rogers was 37, very wealthy and adventurous. He took a sabbatical, donned a motorcycle helmet and travelled the world.