Friday, August 08, 2008

Has Global Markets Decoupled From US Economy?

Mentioned by iCapital's Tan Teng Boo.

  • Meanwhile, Tan said Malaysia and many other countries had been decoupled from the US economy.

    “Although the US economy has affected some sectors of the local market, it has not affected others, such as palm oil, oil and gas and tourism. It (the US economy) would not drag Malaysia into recession,” he said.
Decoupled?

I am simply baffled.

Has the world suddenly turned into a NOT globalised world?

All our exports, all China exports, all India exports and all the other exporting countries, their exports, where do they go?

Can all the exporting countries consume all that they manufacture themselves?

On today's FinancialSense market wrap, market commentator, Michael Panzar, made the following comments on his editorial,
The Experts Continue to Be Wrong


  • For a long time, there was a popular delusion among highly paid Wall Street “strategists” that the rest of the world would be relatively unaffected by an economic downturn in the U.S. Even though America accounted for a quarter of global gross domestic product, they rejected the longstanding reality that when the U.S. sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold -- favoring instead a dubious theory known as “decoupling.” Based on the data included in the chart below, it looks like the so-called experts -- who have been wrong about virtually every aspect of what has taken place over the past year or so -- are turning out to be some of the world’s best contrarian indicators.



    Indeed, many of the same “experts” who claimed that the rest of the world was an unstoppable locomotive also argued that emerging market equities would continue to power ahead, virtually regardless of what happened to share prices in more developed economies. Unfortunately, that assertion has proved to be wide of the mark. In fact, the MSCI Emerging Markets Index is currently down around 25% from its late-autumn peak, which is more than the loss in the S&P 500 index over the same period. True, emerging market equities have performed far better than other markets during the past several years, but if the recent price action in other speculative trading arenas is anything to go by, there may well be a lot more downside to come in this very trendy asset class. (do read rest of his editorial here )
How?

Decoupled?

How many wish this is it but let's not kid ourselves for the last I checked we are still living in planet Earth and this is still the very same global Earth and the world will not be isolated from the ills in the US economy!

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