CNBC has a new report out that says Ukraine was the best performing stock market between 2000 and 2009; Brazil was the best over the past year:
Ukraine — in spite of the fractiousness of its political elite in recent years — that offered an unbeatable return of nearly 900 percent over the decade, data compiled by Reuters show.
The best performing stock market in 2009 was Brazil whose Bovespa Index surged a blistering 145 percent in dollar terms, fueled in part by the 29 percent rise in the value of its real currency versus the greenback.
According to the same story,
Shares in Bahrain and Slovakia were the worst- performing globally in both local-currency and dollar terms, with losses of some 20 percent.
While many factors influence stock market returns, I wondered about whether or not economic freedom changes may be the source of some of the variation.
Since 1995, Ukraine's economic freedom ranking has gone from 3.4 to 5.6. They have gone from being the least free country in the study to 121st of 141. Bahrain's economic freedom score and relative ranking since 1995, meanwhile, has hardly moved. Finally, Slovakia has become quite free since 1995, but they have had a miserable decade.
What do I make of this??? (Answer below the fold).
