Global equity markets lost $5.2 trillion in January: S&P

If investors thought the market could only go up, January's wake-up call pulled them back into reality. Standard & Poor's, the world's leading index provider, announced today that world equity markets lost a combined $5.2 trillion in January as emerging markets fell 12.44 per cent and developed markets lost 7.83 per cent to register one of the worst ever starts to a new year.

These figures and more were released today as part of Standard & Poor's global stock market review, The World by Numbers.

"There were few safe havens in January as 50 of the 52 global equity markets ended the month in negative territory, with 25 of them posting double-digit losses," says Howard Silverblatt, Senior Index Analyst at Standard & Poor's. "High volatility, quick turnarounds in both the market and investor sentiment, and drastically lower stock prices prevailed throughout the month."

Despite gains by Morocco (+10.17 per cent) and Jordan (+3.11 per cent), the world's emerging equity markets were devastated in January, posting an average loss of 12.44 per cent.

Turkey was hit hardest during the month losing 22.70 per cent followed by China (-21.40 per cent), Russia (-16.12 per cent) and India (-16.00 per cent).

Only five emerging markets remain positive for the 3-month period ending January. Only Argentina and Taiwan slipped into negative territory for the 12-month period.