Get the right fund
For broad exposure to developing economies, Philippa Gee, who runs her own wealth management company, recommended a generic emerging markets fund such as First State Global Emerging Market Leaders, run by Angus Tulloch, or JPM Emerging Markets.
David Blake of Jupiter said: "We tend to favour steady fund managers who have a strong track record of protecting clients' capital in downturns." He named Mr Tulloch and the team running Aberdeen's Emerging Markets fund.
Slowly does it
The West's economic future is on a knife edge, and the effects of a meltdown would be felt everywhere. So it's not the time to make big bets. Better to put a set amount into your chosen funds each month, so that, in the event of a sudden fall, you will be adding to your holdings at a lower cost per unit. "I would do this at least for the next six months," said Rob Burdett of Thames River. "We should have a solution to the eurozone crisis by then."
Remember the risks
Mr Blake said: "Some of these countries practise a different form of capitalism, and corporate governance has a long way to go. Some are unstable socially, politically or even geographically. A lot of the investment in the emerging markets has come from Western capital, which can be withdrawn very rapidly."
Some risks are specific to individual countries. Russia is heavily dependent on commodities; China's economy is still heavily controlled by the state. Tom Slater, deputy manager of Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust, said he had been unable to find many attractive investments in India, "perhaps reflecting the conglomerate nature of many of the listed companies and the difficulty in finding management whose interests are well aligned with outside shareholders".
Get exposure indirectly
If the idea of investing in these countries is all a bit too racy, remember that many British companies have large operations in emerging markets.
economic news finance news economic news world us news about us business business news news latest news us news
No comments:
Post a Comment