Emerging Insights

For three decades, oil was the engine of Kazakhstan's post-Soviet prosperity, lifting it to middle-income status and turning it into a darling of frontier market investors. Today, that same oil is the source of a profound national crisis, as the dependencies created during the boom years have transformed into crippling liabilities. The country's economic model was built on a series of calculated risks that have now all come due at once. The most critical was an infrastructure

The emerging-markets rally isn't just about cycling into cheap valuations. Structural shortages in labor and commodities could turn the developing world into the next long-duration growth story. Emerging market stocks have posted their strongest run in over a decade. The iShares MSCI Emerging Markets ETF is up 28.7%  this year after nine straight months of gains . Goldman Sachs expects the rally to continue through 2025, driven by falling inflation, a weaker dollar, and impro

For two decades, a plurality of small economies have built their position in the global marketplace on a simple premise: China's insatiable appetite for inputs. It's well known though that this engine of global growth is sputtering under the weight of debt, demographics, Donald (Trump), and a dosage of the middle income trap. Yet, as China's property sector unravels and its economy pivots away from heavy industry, a new narrative has taken hold in policy circles and investmen

For more than three decades, the Washington Consensus has promoted capital account liberalization as a cornerstone of economic development. The logic appeared unassailable: emerging markets, constrained by domestic savings, would benefit from access to global capital pools, which would finance investment, accelerate productivity growth, and raise living standards. While policymakers acknowledged the risks-sudden stops, currency crises, and financial instability-the prevailing

Last week, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced an $85.2 million settlement with Telefónica Venezolana, the Venezuelan subsidiary of the Spanish telecommunications giant Telefónica, S.A. The case, resolved through a deferred prosecution agreement, was for conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). At first glance, it appeared to be a standard FCPA enforcement action: a multinational subsidiary bribing foreign officials to secure a business advan

Rising yuan adoption during sanctions surges and US dollar strength reflects a hunt for economic survival rather than geopolitical realignment   Introduction Beijing’s push to internationalize the renminbi (RMB) is often viewed through a geopolitical lens within China’s broader effort to redefine and recreate international architecture for its benefit. This is especially true in western financial press, which has fanned worries that the Chinese currency could challenge US dol

The global economy is exhibiting increasing signs of divergence, with the United States charting a course of robust growth while other major economies like the United Kingdom and Japan face economic contractions and heightened uncertainties. This pattern of divergence, underscored by the latest economic performance data, is set to continue, driven by structural changes in demographics, savings rates, and government spending. In the closing months of last year, both the U.K. a

Natural gas markets are shifting from short-term spot market trading toward long-term contracts as developing economies seek to lock in supply and avoid macroeconomic instability. Major LNG importers like India and Brazil now aim to supplement spot purchases with 10-20 year offtake deals. Though spot prices are retreating from 2022's record highs, importers were burned by recent shortages and are willing to pay for insulation from volatility. The change comes after Pakistan'

Russia’s Remarkable Recovery The IMF year’s world economic outlook forecasted the Russian economy grew 2.6% in 2024 , double expectations and faster than all G7 economies for the second year in a row. The figures show how the Western-led sanctions regime has successfully severed the link between Russia and the West but failed to substantially degrade the economy or change Moscow’s behavior in the wake of the 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Such unexpected growth comes despite capit