China’s decision to tighten monetary policy on January 12 and weak corporate earnings reports out of the US have put a damper on bullish equity sentiment in Europe. That said, I still think upside momentum can carry further on a tactical basis. Two markets I particularly like are the Russian RTS and Polish WIG20. With… [Read more]

Emerging European financial markets were generally quiet over the holiday period, as was to be expected, though Turkish stocks chose to buck the trend in style. The benchmark ISE-100 equity index surged to a 12-month high on the final trading day of the year (December 31), ending 2009 at 52,825. The resulting strong monthly close,… [Read more]

As the rally in the more common emerging market assets starts to look shaky, I see a number of reasons to like what’s on offer in frontier markets, Africa in particular. To my mind, the two assets that really stand out are Nigerian equities, and the Ugandan shilling. In the case of Nigerian stocks, I… [Read more]

Me and my colleagues at Business Monitor have remained outright bullish the Brazilian Bovespa since early August – a view which continues to look very strong in the BMI portfolio. At some point today, the position was up 10.4%, and continues to head towards BMI’s 64,000 target, following a strong weekly close last week (at… [Read more]

Amid the surge in commodity prices and the collapse in the dollar, one market which caught my attention today was the Russian RTS equity index. Watching the RTS range trade for the past month, the technical break I’ve been waiting for appears to have finally come and the bulls seem to be in the driver’s… [Read more]

Until the surge in equities this week, the lack of a bear market rally thus far in 2009 had been disquieting – markets do not go down in a straight line forever. Indeed, the Dow is at its most oversold levels on the monthly Relative Strength Index (RSI) ever (at least, going back to 1920),… [Read more]

This week’s market action should eliminate any remaining doubt that we are in a bear market of historic proportions. How historic? There have been some pretty famous bear markets over the last century, and I’ve plotted a few of them on the chart below. Using the peak of the market as the base (at a… [Read more]