Best Emerging Countries for the Next Decade

Introduction

Here are some reasons to think that something is changing quietly to some of these markets or regions.

With the current interest rate policies from the ECB or the Federal Reserve, the currencies from the analyzed emerging countries are now more competitive compared to previous years. Further, they have avoided borrowing and increasing their national debt.

While western developed countries (US and Europe) are focused on conflicts, emerging countries have the time to focus on economy.

Apart from these common advantages, these are 5 of the emerging countries that will play an important role in the years to come.

1. Vietnam

An underdog and unknown by many in terms of financial markets, Vietnam is silently growing and leaving some analysts with the mouth open.

Not long ago, Vietnam was one of the poorest countries in the world. However, since the reform of the Đổi Mới in the 80s, the growth has been stellar and there are several reasons to believe that this growth will continue

With the recent Covid and other situations, Vietnam is one of the fastest growing countries. For example, in 2020, Vietnam’s economy was the best perform amongst all Asian countries. and its objective by 2045 is to be a high-income country. In order to achieve this objective, the population is expected to grow by 10% during this time, which will of course help with this goal

Vietnam has been one of the best-performer economies in the recent years and it is expected to grow further.

2. Philippines

By 2050, Philippines is expected to have a population of around 150 million. It is at that time, when it is expected that Philippines will be in the Top 15 economies of the world. Philippines did not grow much until the 21st century. However, the growth has been fast in the last two decades, focusing on the services sector. Due to these reasons, it has become one of the rising tigers in the Pacific region.

Some of the reasoning for this growth is that Philippines has a young workforce, the population speaks English and the household debt that is low compared to other countries in Asia and the rest of the world.

3. Thailand

Not long ago, Thailand was in the list of undeveloped countries, as some of the countries listed in this article. However, since the 80’s, its economy grew almost at a rate of 10%. This was until the financial crisis of 1997-1998 and 2007-2008. Ever, since the growth has been not that high, but still acceptable and better than the ones of countries in this region.

One of the obstacles is that Thailand has a military government and the instability has been a negative factor during the 21st century. On the other hand, the strategic plan for the next years, called Thailand 4.0, has put emphasis on the transformation of the country into a more modern country by focusing on hi-tech companies and services. In this new era, the technology and the private sector will play an important role in the country’s digital transformation that will push and bolster the country’s economy.

Despite the political instability, Thailand has a clear roadmap defined in Thailand 4.0

4. China

It should not be a surprise seeing China in this list. On the other hand, China was the second-worst performing emerging market in 2021. Some reasons are the regulations and isolation affecting some of the most important technology companies and other big conglomerates. The economic has grown more slowly in the past year, raising some alerts.

In the long term, one thing that is common knowledge is that the goal of China is to dominate the world economically. It is expected that China be the number 1 economy by 2030, overtaking USA. China may be facing some conflicts or obstacles that delay this forecast. However, China knows that they should remain prudent since they don’t want to be the new hegemony over a devastated world.

They have the potential to do so in the upcoming years. Furthermore, while other developed countries were struggling, they have been using different techniques in the recent years: investment in high-tech, R&D, purchase of debt from foreign countries, etc. There is no doubt China will be in the contenders list.

5. India

While different superpowers are engaged in different conflicts or crisis, the sleeping giant India remains silent.

With the economic policy changes introduced at the beginning of the 90s, India has been constantly growing every year. Furthermore, this growth is expected to continue at least for the next 20 years.

The growth is expected thanks to diverse factors such as population, urbanization, technology, private sector. For example, less than 10% of the companies are public. Another advantage compared to countries in this region is that India has inherited the British law system. This means, that regardless of the origin, all investors have the same rights - opposed for example to China -. 

Furthermore, although China is the most populated country today, there are some fertility issues in the Asian country. With this decrease in population in China and the increase in India, it is expected that India will be the most populated country in 30 years.

If the CEOs from the most important companies in the world are from Indian origin, why this cannot be replicated to the different companies in India?