The Chinese New Year holiday is igniting its usual burst of press coverage again. It’s the Year of the Dragon (Chinese year 4710), which is considered an auspicious sign to be born under.

This holiday gets a lot of press in the West, and it’s likely that at least a little of that coverage is due to envy. In the U.S., at least, Christmas rates a one-day holiday and New Year’s Day gets a one-day hangover cure, and that’s it.

Chinese New Year, on the other hand, traditionally runs for a full 15 days, from the dark of a new moon to the full moon. This year the festival began on January 23, and many Chinese living outside cities will celebrate the whole two weeks. In cities, the pressure of modern business has now reduced the holiday (which is known as Spring Festival in China) to “only” one week.

A strong emphasis on family during this holiday season means that people from all over China will have traveled home, clogging trains and buses. Economists always take this into account, adjusting GDP estimates to include at least one week of a virtual shutdown for many factories across China for the duration.

From the Western perspective, one of the best things about Chinese New Year is that it generates a snowstorm of exotic pictures, from dragon dances to fireworks and temples filled with incense. It’s very photogenic, and a good learning opportunity for Westerners who don’t have much insight into what makes Chinese society tick.

But behind the fascinating photo-ops, we’ve been noticing a continuing, serious debate about the future of China. A quick web search will locate at least a half dozen economists and commentators who think that China is going to either implode from the collapse of its housing bubble, commodities bubble or bad bank debt, or explode from the pressure of rising wages, demands for human rights or some other cataclysm.

These dramatic scenarios for the future of China make for interesting reading, but they have very little to do with what Cabot China & Emerging Markets Repot is trying to do, which is to make some money.

The bottom line is that the decline in the Halter USX China Index that we’ve written so much about—the Index dropped from about 6,700 in April 2011 to around 4,200 in October—has created enormous opportunities. Even after a strong January, many emerging market stocks are still trading at big discounts to both their historic price ranges and their own P/E ratios. It has the potential to be a target-rich environment, and we’re starting to see that potential being realized.

The job now is to find the best of the opportunities that the emerging markets are offering and follow the Cabot China-Timer’s lead. The situation is definitely the most hopeful we’ve had in a year.