Can Asia be split into core and peripheral?
Two years on and counting, if the Greek contagion can no longer be contained, would we start to see a split in the performance of Asia’s local bond markets? We caught a glimpse of this last week when Indonesian govies struggled to stay afloat while the likes of Singapore, China, Korea and Hong Kong strengthened despite the broad-based weakening of Asian currencies. By no stretch of imagination can Indonesia be compared to Greece but in the Asian regional context, any small policy misstep may see exaggerated market reactions because of the strong record among the “core” markets.
Indonesia is the happiest country according to the Economist.
Funny how the credit upgrade did not mean anything. I wonder if ratings are even important anymore ?
But to put in perspective, Indo bonds have come a long long way in the past 3 years, makes Singapore look peripheral.
Indonesia yields are almost equal to Italy in local currencies. Indonesia’s re-rating has come a long way so it’s no doubt it reached a exhaustion point. For it to have more legs to run either inflation has to come down much lower or more rating upgrades must come fast.