S&P: World Equity Markets Lose $5.2 Trillion in January

NEW YORK, Feb. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- 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% and developed markets lost 7.83% 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."
All 26 developed equity markets posted negative returns in January, with
16 losing at least 10% of their value. The January declines negated all
previous market gains, leaving all of the developed markets in the red for the
trailing 3-month period. Twelve-month returns were mixed with 15 developed
markets in positive territory and eleven in the red (six with double-digit
negative returns).
Despite gains by Morocco (+10.17%) and Jordan (+3.11%), the world's
emerging equity markets were devastated in January, posting an average loss of
12.44%. Turkey was hit hardest during the month losing 22.70% followed by
China (-21.40%), Russia (-16.12%) and India (-16.00%). 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.
All ten GICS sectors posted losses in January in contrast to October and
September when all ten were in positive territory. Information Technology
posted a broad 11.57% influenced mostly to U.S. losses (ex U.S. -9.48%). The
Energy sector remained close behind at -11.45%. In general, non-U.S. Consumer
related (Discretionary and Staples) issues did worse than their U.S.
counterparts, as did Financials. Value (-6.98%) continued to outperform growth
(-8.63%), although both declined for the month. Asian Pacific Growth dropped
15.95% and European Value declined 17.05% for the 3-month period.
The S&P/Citigroup World by Numbers Report for January can be accessed in
full by going to www.worldbynumbers.standardandpoors.com. In addition, a table
showing the performance of the S&P/Citigroup BMI Index can be found at the
conclusion of this release.

S&P/Citigroup BMI Total Returns*
January - 08
1-Month % 3-Months % 12-Months %
France -12.27 -15.27 -0.74
Germany -13.72 -13.84 13.43
Japan -4.47 -10.31 -10.44
United Kingdom -8.85 -16.54 -2.22
United States -6.07 -10.78 -2.42

Asia Pacific -7.50 -14.42 -1.00
Europe -10.48 -15.30 0.74
North America -6.15 -11.16 -0.83
Dev. World -7.83 -13.09 -0.35

Brazil -8.59 -11.33 61.44
China -21.41 -34.00 37.25
India -16.00 -9.35 47.83
Mexico -1.89 -7.67 10.92
Russia -16.12 -10.20 9.12
Taiwan -10.95 -22.86 -0.49

Emerging Markets -12.44 -16.98 24.51

*Country returns in $US
Source: Standard & Poor's
Data as of: 1/31/08

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SOURCE Standard & Poor's

David Guarino Communications Standard & Poor's +1-212-438-1471
dave_guarino@standardandpoors.com or Howard Silverblatt Senior Index Analyst
Standard & Poor's +1-212-438-3916 howard_silverblatt@standardandpoors.com