According to analysts from Wells Fargo, financial crises in Emerging Market economies today likely would not derail the US economy despite the fact that exposure to the developing world increased over the last two decades.
Key Quotes:
“American exports to developing economies shot up from about $250 billion in 2003 to more than $700 billion last year. Today, developing economies account for roughly one-half of U.S. exports. But exports of total goods and services are equivalent to only 14 percent of U.S. GDP. American exports of goods and services to developing economies would need to weaken significantly to have a meaningful effect on U.S. GDP growth.”
“Data from the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) show that the exposure of the American banking system to developing economies totaled nearly $800 billion at the end of Q2-2018, which is obviously a sizeable amount. However, the financial assets of the U.S. banking system exceed $15 trillion, so exposure of American banks to developing economies represents only 5 percent of their financial assets at present.”
“At the end of 2016 (latest available data), Americans owned about $3 trillion worth of EM stocks and bonds. Sharp declines in the value of those assets probably would not go unnoticed by American investors. But American households held $75 trillion worth of financial assets at the end of 2016. A complete rout of EM financial markets, should one occur, would not lead to catastrophic losses for most American households.“
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