Over the past few days, the rand has weakened by 10%, the Russian rouble by 9% and the Turkish lira by a massive 26% relative to the US dollar. On a year to date basis the rand is down almost 11%. This broad emerging market contagion has affected equities as well, with the MSCI Emerging Market Index down 17% from its January peak. China’s Shanghai Composite Index entered a bear market in July, having fallen more than 20% from the January peak, a technical definition of a bear market, while Turkey has been in a bear market territory since May. In US dollar terms equity markets in Brazil, Russia, South Africa and Nigeria markets followed the others on Friday. The rand has also broken through the psychologically important R14/US$ level. The three main catalysts for the sudden acceleration of the sell-off in emerging markets have been US President Donald Trump’s tweet attacks on both Turkey and Russia, higher than expected US inflation numbers, as well as additional trade tariffs o...
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