In Hungary, it turns out that Prime Minister Gyurscany lied about the health of the economy in trying to get reelected. This has resulted in demonstrations in the streets including, according to one story I read, a takeover of state-run television!
Thailand is currently enduring a coup. A coup?!
Prime Minister Thaksin has been controversial for a several years, and it looks like it has reached a boiling point.
I write a lot about investing in emerging markets, and I have unyielding faith that the asset class belongs in a diversified portfolio, but moderation is very important and something I have tried to convey here.
I had countless comments and emails from readers with 20%-30% in emerging markets last winter before the spring correction. I urged those people to cut back, but who knows if they did.
IMO, equal weight is about 7%, and for some folks, that is too much, which is OK. The current events of this week will not be the last disruptions in your lifetime for these markets.
Be exposed, yes, but also be prudent.
7 comments:
Since the first Thai constitution was promulgated in 1932, there have been 19 general elections accompanied by 19 military coups.
In other words, so what else is new?
I try to convey that point in saying there will be other EM disruptions and it is still very interesting to watch it unfold.
Yes. No criticism of your comments intended. Since this has been going on for nearly 75 years, one must assume it works for the Thais. But it certainly is a little odd by most standards.
Hi Roger,
Do you have a list of asset classes and the percentages you think best represent equal weight for each? I know there are lots of caveats, each investor is different(age, tax circumstances, risk tolerance, etc.), but hypothetically if you were forced to prescribe the same asset allocation for all of your clients, what would it be?
Roger...the fund that blew up over natural gas may signal that the commodity run is over. talking heads say the hedge funds inflated the run. slosh, slosh. the herd is moving on. so much money and not enough places to put it. and i thought we would have a more effecient market place. what happens when being short becomes fashionable? Investing is like making sausage. Buy and hold, and hold stands for hold your nose and don't look. Closer to lifting that short position? great blog.
The short position has shrunk since the market has gone up. The bigger drag has been the cash and the underweight in tech.
I like the Latin American market, particularly Mexico and Brazil. I had some in Fidelity latin American fund, but the fund has dropped lately because of turmoil in Mexican election.
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Peter Chin (Vancouver, Canada)
Moneyfingers Blog: Adventures in Personal Finance and Investments
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