NEW YORK, Jan. 11 /PRNewswire/ — Standard & Poor's, the leading provider of financial market intelligence, announced today that emerging equity markets outperformed that of developed equity market in 2007. According to Standard & Poor's global stock market review, The World by Numbers, emerging markets rose 42.0% in 2007 versus a gain of 9.4% for the world's developed markets.
"The current and expected sales growth in the emerging equity markets fueled their returns in 2007," says Howard Silverblatt, Senior Index Analyst at Standard and Poor's. "As a result, we saw an outflow of cash from the developed markets into emerging."
The month of December saw 19 of the 26 developed world equity markets landing in negative territory, an improvement from the 24 developed markets that were down in November. Losses were mostly modest in December although Iceland (-11.58%) posted its second consecutive month of double digit-declines (-15.48% for November). Canada rebounded from its double-digit November loss (-11.17%) to post a 2.69% gain in December. Luxembourg was the best developed market performer last month, gaining 3.83%.
16 of the 26 emerging market countries gained ground in December with impressive returns seen in India (+9.09%), Nigeria (+8.75%) and Egypt (+8.07%). Losses were moderate across the emerging market board with both Peru (-4.64%) and China (-3.82%) declining the most during the month; however, both countries posted strong full-year gains of 72.88% and 69.83% respectively. 11 of the 26 emerging markets gained at least 50% in 2007 with Nigeria coming in best with a 115.32% gain. China, which received most of the public's attention in 2007, gained 69.83% for the year ranking it 7 out of the 26 markets.
As for sectors, 9 of the 10 sectors posted losses in December compared to just seven in November. Both figures stand in sharp contrast to October and September, when all ten sectors were up. The Energy sector posted a strong 5.41% December gain, with the U.S. energy sector performing the best. Conversely, Consumer Discretionary was the worst performing sector last month, declining 3.26%, with U.S. issues hit the hardest. Growth (-0.97%) outperformed Value (-1.81%) though both were negative for the month.
The S&P/Citigroup World by Numbers Report for December can be accessed in full by going to http://www.standardandpoors.com/indices. In addition, a table showing the performance of the S&P/Citigroup BMI Index can be found at the conclusion of this release.
S&P/Citigroup BMI Total Returns*
December - 07
1-Month % 3-Months % 12-Months %
France -1.71 0.57 12.78
Germany 1.49 4.35 33.83
Japan -4.34 -5.99 -5.35
United Kingdom -2.90 -2.59 7.03
United States -0.64 -3.14 5.78
Asia Pacific -3.33 -4.47 7.47
Europe -1.92 -0.88 13.47
North America -0.36 -2.92 7.45
Dev. World -1.38 -2.51 9.41
China -3.82 -2.45 69.83
India 9.09 25.19 80.85
Mexico -0.51 -1.36 15.44
Russia 5.10 17.37 23.06
South Africa -3.66 2.16 18.83
Taiwan -1.77 -9.97 8.71
Emerging Markets 1.05 5.30 42.05
*Country returns in $US
Source: Standard & Poor's
Data as of: 12/31/07
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CONTACT:
David Guarino
Communications
Standard & Poor's
+1-212-438-1471
dave_guarino@standardandpoors.com
Howard Silverblatt
Senior Index Analyst
Standard & Poor's
+1-212-438-3916
howard_silverblatt@standardandpoors.com
