Global Stock Market Performance Update: The BRICs and Emerging Markets Dominate Gains

Bespoke Invest gives us a good rundown on the performances of global stockmarkets as of Apr 16th.

According to Bespoke, ``The MSCI World index bottomed on March 9th just as the S&P 500 did. Below is a table highlighting stock market performance for 83 countries around the world since March 9th and year to date. As shown, Ukraine is up the most since March 9th with a gain of 67%. Ukraine is followed by Puerto Rico, Romania, Peru, and Russia. Even after rallying 52.7% since March 9th, Puerto Rico is still down 34% year to date. Ten countries are actually down since March 9th, with Bermuda falling the most at 22%.

``Of the BRIC countries, Russia has done the best since March 9th, followed by India (34%), Brazil (24%), and then China (19.6%). Italy has been the best performing G-7 country with a gain of 37.7%. The US ranks second in the G-7, followed by Germany, Japan, and Canada. The UK has been the worst performing G-7 country since March 9th with a gain of 14%.

Bespoke uses the March 9th low as reference point from which has been premised from the US bottom.

We don't like to get caught in a selective perception since as the stockcharts.com above shows that China and Emerging Markets have begun to recover even prior to the US bounce.

We also don't buy the argument that the reason for outperformance of EM economies has been due to the degree of losses suffered. This "rear view mirror" perspective glosses over the overall boom bust performances of EM versus G7 from 2003-todate. It's no use to nitpick over "technicalities" though, since the playing field is always about tomorrow.

And our thought is that EM markets are likely to continue to outperform the structurally credit bubble-bust impaired G7 economies.

On a year to date basis, Bespoke adds, ``Year to date, Peru ranks first with a gain of 45.47%, followed by China, Pakistan, and Taiwan. Bermuda, Costa Rica, and Nigeria are down the most year to date."

We'd like to alter how the above quote has been framed.

On a year to date basis:

Except for Canada whose gains registered 2.58%, the rest of the G7 markets are all negative: Italy 6.45%, US 5.47%, Germany 4.17%, Japan 1.18%, France 5.59% and Britain 8.6%.

In contrast the BRIC's scorecard are all markedly positive: Brazil 21.2%, Russia 29.7%, India 13.48% and China 39.18%. Moreover, most EM markets are likewise up.

Our point: Global financial markets presently debunk the claims that "decoupling is a myth".