By Bespoke Invest
At just under 1,140, the S&P 500 sits more than 400 points (or 27%) below its all-time high of 1,565.15 made on October 9th, 2007. Imagine for a moment how nice it would be if the S&P 500 had already recovered all of its losses from the collapse and was now trading back into the 1,500s. If you live in Mexico, India, Malaysia, or Brazil, this is your reality right now. The financial crisis is now in your rearview mirror.
Below we highlight the current distance from the highs made prior to the ’07/’08 global bear market for the major equity indices of 22 key countries around the world. As shown, Mexico is currently 3% above its pre-collapse high! India’s Sensex is just 2% from its prior high, while Malaysia and Brazil are just 4% off. South Korea is the only other country that is less than 10% from its pre-bear market high. As noted earlier, the US is 27% from its all-time high, which is just about in the middle of the pack of the countries shown. China and Italy are the farthest away from the highs they made back in 2007. China’s Shanghai Composite is currently 56.41% below its high made on 10/16/07, while Italy’s FTSE MIB is 54.71% below its high made on 5/18/07. Japan’s Nikkei 225 is the 3rd worst at -49%, France (CAC-40) is 4th worst at -40.83%, and Russia (RTSI) is 5th worst at -38.15%.
The “BRIC” acronym became a household name in the mid-2000s as the 4 emerging countries that BRIC represents experienced big economic and market returns. While all four countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China) are still seeing pretty solid economic growth, their equity markets have taken extremely divergent paths recently. India and Brazil are just about back to all-time highs, while Russia and China are basically half of their former selves.
Tags: % of pre-crisis highs, country stock performance comparisons, global country stock markets