Emerging Stocks Rise to One-Week High on U.S. Retail Data
Emerging-market stocks rose to the highest level in more than a week after U.S. retail sales beat estimates and as a report showed improved German investor sentiment, boosting the outlook for exports.
The MSCI Emerging Markets Index (MXEF) rallied 0.7 percent to 1,002.32 as of 1:19 p.m. in London, poised for the highest close since Oct. 5. Samsung Electronics Co. surged the most in more than a month in Seoul, helping a gauge of technology stocks to the biggest gain among 10 industry groups on the main measure. Turkey’s ISE National 100 Index (XU100) rose to the highest level in more than two years, led by Asya Katilim Bankasi AS (ASYAB) after JPMorgan Chase & Co. named the nation’s banks among its top picks for central and eastern Europe.
German investor confidence gained for a second month in October, the ZEW Center for European Economic Research in Mannheim said today. The Commerce Department announced yesterday that retail sales in the U.S. climbed 1.1 percent in September, compared with the 0.8 percent expansion forecast by economists. The 21 nations in MSCI’s developing-nations gauge send about 30 percent of their exports to the European Union and 13 percent to the U.S. on average, according to data compiled by the World Trade Organization.
“There is positive news where there wasn’t two months ago,” Charles Robertson, global chief economist at Renaissance Captial in London, said by telephone. “There is a growing belief we might avoid a hard landing.”
