By January 23, 2014
First it was the BRICs, now it's the MINTs. Former Goldman Sachs economist Jim O'Neill who coined the term BRICS to refer to the emerging markets of Brazil, Russia, India, China and, subsequently South Africa, has come up with a new one.
"MINT" refers to Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey and O'Neill's premise is that these four counties will be the next economic powerhouses due to their youthful and growing populations that will supply workers; geographical proximity to large, nearby markets with impact trade (US, China and the EU) and in the case of Nigeria, a strong example of a rising African continent; and (Turkey excepted) being commodity producers. Of the four, only Nigeria is not already a member of the G20 group of developed and developing countries. As part of the newly MINTed acronym, there may be pressure on Nigeria to join the G20 group.
But will these new market darlings live up to the hype? Too soon to tell. A recent Forbes commentary by Chris Wright notes that many investors in the BRICS' stock markets " would have done better keeping their money at home," and that "only China has really lived up to the growth hype and is now the world's second biggest economy."
One can be confident, however, that simply being included in this bloc of to-be-much-discussed markets will surely focus attention on these economies and bring them further into the global spotlight which should be good for their respective property markets.
ICREA
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