For years, in fact for the duration of the US dollar’s use as a global carry currency, Emerging Markets – especially those with a currency peg – were a welcome destination for yield starved US investors who found an easy source of yield differential pick up. All that came to a crashing halt first after the Chinese devaluation in 2015 which sent the dollar surging and slammed the EM sector, and then again in recent months when renewed strong dollar-inspired turmoil gripped the emerging markets, first due to idiosyncratic factors – such as those in Turkey and Argentina…

… and gradually across the entire world, as contagion spread.

And while many pundits have stated that there is no reason to be concerned, and that the EM spillover will not reach developed markets, Morgan Stanley points out that the real pain may lie ahead.

As the following chart from the bank’s global head of EM Fixed Income strategy, James Lord, shows, whereas returns have slumped across EM rates, outflows from the EM space have a ways to go before they catch down to the disappointing recent returns.

One can make two observations here: the first is that despite the equity rout, EM stocks (as captured by the EEM ETF) have a long way to go to catch down to EM bonds as shown by the Templeton EM Bond Fund (TEMEMFI on BBG).

The second, more salient point is that a key reason for the solid growth across emerging markets in recent years, has been the constant inflow of foreign capital, resulting in a significant external funding requirement for continued growth, especially for Turkey as discussed previously.

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