Markets are as good as their regulatory and legal services. The SEC, the Accounting agencies post Enron and the local legal authorities(think Spitzer) can do a good job when they are funded properly and the large firms that bring companies to market do their jobs(failures like REFCO are prettty uncommon on that end).

The markets overseas do not have the record or the personnel often to provide the regulatory and legal status to protect investors. Many because they are new to the job and some because of endemic corruption. Those in the PRC probably present the biggest problem because regardless of your class of stock the govt of the PRC is the largest shareholder and transperancy is not an issue for them; political stablity is. For many other new markets the problem lies in the accounting systems to provide accurate information about how the company is doing on a fiscal and financial basis.

The biggest risk lies in the fact that unlike in the late 90's, the US is unable to provide liquidity to the system to keep it stable during a crisis. As the biggest holder of US currency and debt is now the PRC but is also the biggest operator in the commodity and merchantile marketplace it will be interesting to see if they can respond.

We have had another example of state vs private operator conflict in the copper market in the last two weeks. A Chinese national has a huge position in copper which is reported to be actually the PRC's(the national's status as a representative of the PRC trading arm is in question) and it is in default. It sounds like a potential Barings Bank scandal but unlike poor Nick it does not have a capitalist sponsor to be held responsible for the loss. It is hard to be a capitalist and not want a piece of that pie.

Other problems for those small markets is that due to lack of liquidity there are index's representing baskets of those countries leading stocks. Under SEC rules you do not have to own the physical to create a basket. They are often exempt from the down tick rule for shorts so we could potentially have a waterfall effect should a decent sized market under an exogenous event and everyone wants to get out of their paper. While we eliminated this problem for our market after Oct 1987 iwould not want to be sanguine about the possiblity.

Remember these countries probably have dollar denominated debt and pegged or fix currency problems to deal with as well.

All in all you want to play these types of market places with money in your risk account not your retirement one.

This is simplistic (not Dan; Robert M). Many people have persuasively demonstrated that the SEC and the FASB and especially Spitzer are bad, not good, for our markets (or at least they often are). It's not that our markets and institutions are so heavily regulated that makes them attractive (and, to Dan's point, able easily to bear risk). In part, in fact, it's the relative paucity of corporate and securities regulation that keeps our markets and our corporations strong. But, most important, it's surely the rule of law and the protection of property rights (not only from others but also from the government) that facilitates massive liquidity and risk bearing. It's not what the SEC can do, it's what it can't do that separates us from China. It's the enforceability of contracts and the fairly well-observed distinction between "private" and "public" that support our institutions and markets. A strong SEC on this view is mostly a signal not that small investors will be protected by the government (they won't) but that the markets function so well that they can absorb even fairly substantial and continuous interference from the likes of the SEC.

I just wanted to say what a pleasure browising your sight! Wonderful sense of hummer! Above my head on investing! :-) Have a great weekend!

Does this make any sense?

Certainly it makes sense. Both groups of people diversify and reduce overall risk by investing in other countries. You can reduce your risk even by investing in a risky market if that market moves in a way not correlated with your home market. In this case, US people hedge against the US market growing more slowly than developing country markets, and people in developing countries do the reverse. It makes sense for both.

> Many people have persuasively demonstrated
> that the SEC and the FASB and especially
> Spitzer are bad, not good, for our markets
> (or at least they often are)

Almost all of the ex-Enron ex-retirees subscribe to that theory, for example. At least when they have time to think about it after finishing their 24-hour shifts locked into the local Wal-Mart.

Cranky

A basic result in financial economics is that if a risk-free asset (meaning cash) exists, then the only difference between the optimal portfolio for an investor able to handle a lot of risk and and the optimal portfolio for a more risk-adverse investor is that the latter will hold more cash. I'm not in a good position to say whether the theory underlying this result matches the real world. If it does, then a comparative advantage in risk cannot exist; the actors will equalize the playing field by holding more or less cash, depending on their aversion to risk.

geoff manne says that the rule of law makes out markets great but the institutions that enforce those laws are bad for the markets. Does that seem as internally inconsistent to others as it does to me?

Is there any economic activity that doesnt have the seeds of impending disaster built into it?

Interesting choice of gloom&doomsters in the WAPO article: AEI, Bush CEA staff, a guy from well co-opted Citigroup. In view of the administration's PR fixation and the paper's willingness to go along, one would guess that this is an attempt to ward off the capital flight that oughta result from reversal of Fed rate hikes (which in turn will be necessary when homeowners' leverage goes negative.) But really, country risk's a reason to diversify with forex, not stay home with our 19 P/E and 4 1/2%.

Kenneth, Cash has no risk only in the textbooks, because in real world it is one of the riskiest forms of wealth. Cash is a promise to pay - by a government. Governments systematically erode the value of cash, steal or tax your money and put regulations of what you may do with it. If you have to flee, cash is as much of a resource as a source of risk. The surest way of moving resources into the future is by having healthy children.