If the world economy is to maintain any
sort of momentum this year, it will be driven by fast-growing emerging markets
led by China. But like the developed world, the emerging nations are living in
the shadow of the globe’s greatest economic threat – the eurozone crise. From
Galicia to Guangdong, business is more globalised than ever before. And the
explosion of financial links, alongside traditional trade ties, means that
economic news travels at unprecedented speed – especially, or so it often
seems, bad news.
While there are reports of progress in
tackling the challenges faced by Greece, Italy and other vulnerable eurozone
states, the eurozone’s traumas are far from over. “The crisis has damaged the
European economy . . . and this crisis is by no means behind us,”
Olli Rehn, European Union economy commissioner, said this week. “It will take
time. Structural reforms often take a long time . . . Markets,
however, tend to be impatient and this impatience can push sovereigns or
banking institutions into a liquidity crisis.”
As things stand, the eurozone is expected
to fall into recession in 2012, helping to drag global economic growth down to
about 3-3.5 per cent. But the world could fare far worse if Mr Rehn’s fear of a
possible liquidity crisis does materialise. Its effects would hit nations far
beyond Europe, not least in the developing world. As the charts show, the economic and financial links between the eurozone and developing countries run deep – and have grown hugely in the past decade. While these connections have contributed greatly to the development both of the EU and emerging markets, they are also transmission belts of economic danger. The dividing line between risk and reward can be very fine and the swing from boom to bust very rapid, as investors found in successive emerging market crises, including Asia in 1997-98, Russia in 1998, Brazil in 2002 and central and eastern Europe in 2009.
A glance at the data demonstrates the impact on emerging markets: a big sell-off in equities in 2011, higher bond yields reflecting bigger risk premiums, and forecasts of a growth slowdown in 2012 compared with 2011.
The risk of a general banking retreat from eastern Europe is limited. But banks are distinguishing between the economically strong, headed by Poland, and the weak, led by Hungary – as the populist government in Budapest has seen to its cost.
Further afield, eurozone-related risks are lower. While Asian exporters trade actively with the eurozone, they are increasingly looking for business in other emerging markets. But world financial markets are so interlinked that a shock for one financial centre quickly becomes a shock for all, including the emerging powerhouses.