The first few weeks of the new US administration have made one issue quite clear – President Trump is keen to deliver on his campaign promises. One of the cornerstones of his declared policy is to negotiate better trade deals for the US with its neighbours such as Mexico and Canada, as well as with key trade partners in Asia.
Where does that leave trade-dependent Asia and the other emerging markets (EM), many of which count the US as among their top three trading partners? And how should the investors play the emerging trend?
To tackle this question, one needs to first examine the backdrop. There are a few factors favouring the EMs at the moment. First, the EM growth is accelerating relative to the developed market (DM) growth for the first time since 2009 and Asia is set to remain the biggest growth driver for the global economy.
Second, the EM equity market valuations are more attractive than those in the DMs after years of underperformance. Third, many EMs, especially outside Asia, are emerging from recessions and/or sharp downturns in their equity, bond and currency markets.
The other factors such as increased commodity price stability, greater reform efforts and stability in China are also positives for many EMs. Indeed, these factors arguably contributed to the EM equity outperformance over the DMs for the first time in four years in 2016.
Against these favourable trends, there are counter-balancing factors. Apart from the likelihood of trade frictions, the most significant risk facing Asia and the EMs is that of rising interest rates in the US as Trump’s policies could potentially generate faster growth and higher inflation. Historically, higher US rates have tended to be a challenging environment for many EMs, given the possibility of triggering capital outflows.
However, we believe capital outflows are not inevitable. There are three factors to keep in mind. First, that many EMs (including China) have already faced significant capital outflows. This suggests the most susceptible components may already have left. Second, the gap between the low US rates today and fairly high rates in many EMs is quite high. This may offer an additional source of support for the EMs.
Finally, the US interest rates would most probably have to rise at a faster pace than what is already expected in order to trigger large-scale capital outflows. Markets are arguably already looking for at least one rate hike from the Fed this year, so an upside surprise from this baseline would likely be needed in order for markets to start worrying about the EMs.
There could even be situations where the US rates go up, but they are not detrimental to the EM assets and currencies.
A prudent approach
For one, the US interest rates could rise, but at a much slower pace than expected. This would imply higher yielding EM currencies (like the INR or IDR) may be less vulnerable than lower yielding ones. Second, the EM growth could continue to accelerate relative to developed market growth, which would underpin interest in the EM equity exposure.
Finally, the EM currencies may have already priced in a significant portion of the risks, leaving less room for further downside. The Malaysian ringgit is a good example of this given just how much it has already weakened over the past few years.
Moreover, in equity markets, the EMs have a valuation advantage over the DMs. On average, the DMs are much more fully valued while the EMs are generally more inexpensive when compared with their respective earnings expectations. However, there is a great deal of dispersion across countries.
Hence, for investors, a prudent approach would be to be highly selective, looking for the best rewards on offer for the risk taken. Globally, the US and Japan (currency hedged) remain our most preferred equity markets given their strong earnings outlook. Within Asia, Indian and Indonesian equities appear most attractive, in our view, given their domestic focus (which should shield them better against any trade frictions), positive long-term structural growth outlook, falling interest rates and continued reform efforts.
Hong Kong and China equities have delivered solid performances year-to-date as weakness in the US dollar helped the EM equities generally. These equity markets are likely to be supported due to their reasonable valuation. Chinese banks, with their cheap valuation and high dividend yield, should be an area of focus for local investors. Elsewhere, China ‘new economy’ stocks are likely to do well, given their higher profit margins and better revenue and earnings growth prospects compared with the ‘old economy’ sectors.
Within bonds, prospects of higher Fed rates and inflation warrant a shift away from higher grade government and corporate debt to less rate-sensitive DM high yield corporate bonds and the US floating rate loans. In Asia, though, we believe a focus on higher quality Asian US dollar corporate bond is prudent, given the risks around deteriorating credit quality, especially in China.
Within currencies, the Chinese yuan is likely to continue to weaken gradually, as in past years, along with broad-based gains in the US dollar. However, the Indian rupee, Indonesian rupiah, Brazilian real and Russian ruble are likely to outperform other EM currencies.
As President Trump rolls out his agenda in the first 100 days of office, it is unclear to what extent he can deliver what he promised to his constituency. A lot depends on how well he can cut deals with his fellow Republicans in the US Congress and how successfully he fends off increasingly strident Democrat opposition to implement tax cuts, deregulation and increased spending on the US infrastructure.
For investors in the EMs, the prospects for trade protectionism remain a big unknown as many export-oriented EMs could be at risk from an increasingly protectionist world. Regardless of how these risk factors pan out, several investment opportunities exist in this politically uncertain environment.
(Manpreet Gill is Head of Fixed Income, Currency and Commodity Strategy at Standard Chartered Private Bank)
