Emerging Markets

Right now, everyone is talking about an emerging markets crisis due to the simultaneous turmoil in several emerging markets. I am not concerned about this being a full-blown crisis yet. At the same time, I do want to use this as a launchpad…

Central banks of several nations who are experiencing sharp currency declines are taking action to stabilize the situation. But not the Russians. The nation's central bank likes the weak ruble because the currency decline boosts the…

- The most important development has been the dramatic rate hike by the central bank of Turkey - The effective tightening by the Turkish central bank was 2.25% - a lot less dramatic than the headlines would suggest - The rate hikes in…

As the emerging markets contagion spreads, the BRIC nations are coming under increasing pressure in the capital markets. As discussed previously Brazil and Russia are witnessing new multi-year/record lows in their currency valuations.

The global capital markets imploded in the second half of last week and investors spent the weekend contemplating the significance. The main focus was on the emerging markets, which were especially hard hit. Emerging market crisis have…

On Friday, I wrote about the slowdown in China, the bear market in commodities, and the volatility in emerging markets as being all interrelated. Of course, there is more to the selloff in emerging markets than just the slowdown in China…

Back in early December the government of Argentina raised taxes on credit card purchases in foreign currency to 35% from 20%. Online Christmas shopping abroad became increasingly expensive. However, dollars continued to flow out of the…

I am less and less concerned about the eurozone periphery over the medium term because recovery in Europe looks poised to last. On the other hand, the slowdown in China could have wide-ranging consequences, particularly for countries…

We appear to be on the cusp of a more serious crisis in Argentina, as things are moving from bad to worse. Spot ARS has dropped as much as 20% earlier today, while the implied “blue chip” FX rate has fallen nearly 10% over the past two…

Some of the largest natural resource exporters with floating exchange rates have seen their currencies come under significant pressure over the past year.