It is self-evident that emerging markets stand to benefit disproportionately from healthy growth in world trade. They tend to have smaller, less wealthy populations compared with developed countries, so that exports are a bigger swing factor for them than domestic consumption.
Look at the chart below and this theory held up well from the start of the century until 2008: as global trade expanded rapidly each year (right hand scale), so — by and large — did EM GDP growth (left hand scale). However, while both have recovered from the financial crisis, a significant gap has opened up between the two lines, which were previously closely correlated.
World trade is not exactly thriving these days, rising just 2.3 per cent in the first quarter of this year on an annual basis — but it is at least still growing in value (as well as volume). The pace of EM growth, though, has actually been on a sharp decline since 2010. The reasons for this were deftly analysed in a previous piece on EM Squaredand come down to the slump in commodity prices, the rise in the US dollar and the fact that China, by far the biggest EM, is both slowing rapidly itself and, consequently, sucking in fewer exports from other EMs.