Friday Five

Bukalapak – one of the five unicorn start-ups in Indonesia – is in our view only a peripheral player in the country’s e-commerce boom and its market share will likely contract. We think it has been grossly overvalued considering the substantial risks to its investment case.

Omicron has sparked concern over how fast it might be transmitted, the level of protection from current vaccines as well as from prior infection, and the re-imposition of lockdowns and travel restrictions. But the behaviour of markets to the initial Covid outbreak and to the Delta variant suggests sell-offs are temporary.

This week's China-Africa Cooperation forum (FOCAC – the 8th edition) saw investors focus on the amount of capital pledged by China, in the form of grants, concessional loans, trade finance and debt write-offs, to Africa. How will the US respond in the new scramble for Africa.

Nirgunan Tirchelvam argues the Omicron variant is unlikely to rattle the recovery trade in EM tourism stocks. Although companies in the travel, tourism and entertainment sectors took a beating in last Friday's stock market sell-off, he says investors should position themselves for a buying opportunity.

We have updated our list of '10%-ers', a list of the number of countries with foreign bonds yielding 10% or more (or which are in default), as a proxy for who is, or might be, in distress.