So tell us a little bit about how we can Hedge potentially with some asian assets All of this uncertainty and volatility Coming from the geopolitical side of Things Thank you sure yeah you're right uh so Much uncertainty going on where is a Safe Harbor or safer harbor we think asia Offers some security as a haven there For a number of reasons one of them Would be a large amount the equity Markets have you know lagged so they Don't have that Valuation Headwind that others do that are much More uh much more difficult and Particularly if you can find Equities which we see in asean region That are commodity focused at a more Domestic focus that are not as widely Held so a little bit more sticky we Think these spaces offer interesting Value in the current market and malaysia Is probably first uh first uh to the top At the moment for us Alongside some other as i said asean Regions and they hold a lot of the key And then also you've got china after the Mpc uh meeting later or the national Party meeting uh later in march we do Think we're gonna get meaningful easing After that um so there's a number of Tailwinds in asia compared to the rest
Of the world I find it really interesting that you Actually like some of these asean Nations because we continue to see of Course Pressure coming from covid where are you Seeing the most opportunities right now Well sorry like you said there's there's A lot of challenges around there's still Covert challenges it's not reopening Challenges and i think the asean region Unlike maybe uh uh north asia where uh The the covert uh lockdowns are more Stringent some of the asean regions are Actually opening up uh living in Singapore there's a lot of etl lines now Right around the area so i do think the Reopening trade is starting to uh ease And become a lot easier we're doing more Business trips around the region which i Think is is constructive then if you Take into consideration the spaces that Are more commodity exporters that are Less focused on european trade who or Potentially going to be feeling the pain A lot more um i i do think that the Asian region has quite a lot of Interesting space to to add today Um If there's going to be muted growth and Potential further downside out of china Does that impact your kind of level of Of constructiveness when it comes to Emerging markets
I think we've been talking about Weakening china since october uh we said Even the first quarter was going to be Tough and we do think that from an Economic perspective uh you know it's Still going to be challenging for china Uh market participants are Forward-looking we're going to be Looking to uh when do we see a Turnaround in this uh in this dynamic When are we going to start seeing more Support And now a real thesis for china is 2022 Is the year of implementation And for implementation you need Stability so we think whilst the Regulations are changing we think Probably the worst of the regulations From a market perspective or behind us Um we do think easing is coming through Uh and we think whilst it's becoming It's still a very political year uh we Think there will be real focus this year On keeping that stability and that's Going to be good for markets in china And be good for the region and you take This into contrast what's happening in Europe what's going to be happening in The us with domestic politics later in The year I think this just lines up to An interesting space also given the Valuation a differential between the two Gareth i want to take you to our
Question of the day on our m live blog Which is really asking the question of How investors should be viewing or Pricing the russia supply shock right is It inflationary is it stagflationary And i think it's interesting because the Answer to that question is going to kind Of inform what risk you see i guess a More hawkish reaction from central banks Or You know the possibility of a central Bank missed it That's a tough question right it's still So early in the process and given this Is uh seems to be much more of a Financial sanction driven war It's obviously not on the ground um But we do think that this means it's Probably the biggest risk for financial Markets is commodity chaos commodity Cows in the sense that you know one of The largest exporters are grain company Grains and ports can't get it onto Trains uh the the ships won't be Serviced when they hit different ports They're saying the black sea the oil That's going through there Gets stored there's potential pipeline Issues these are some of the risks that We see for commodity chaos and we think This commodity chaos uh is going to Drive further market uh um Direction when it comes to inflation we Already seen backwardation of the
Commodities indexes is very bullish for The space and and really i think one of The biggest things is a lot of investors A lot of economists saw inflation Moderating starting to moderate as soon As you know april may um that is Starting to get pushed further back Now if moderation is getting further Back that's when central banks are going To get really nervous and this is why we Feel that at the moment central banks Are still focusing on inflation growth Is still okay you look at surveys out of The u.s they're still constructive Business activities still are solid so We do think that it's going to be more Focused on inflation
