Kazahkstan, Croatia among markets highlighted by Citi strategist

Citigroup Global Markets strategist Andrew Howell was on Bloomberg this past week discussing investing in frontier markets.  Howell highlights Kazahkstan in particular as exemplifying the broader frontier story: relatively low valuations despite abundant resources and low debt, with (thus far) a smoother return and less risk correlation than developed indices or the BRICs, despite the fact that most frontiers in general rely on said economies for the bulk of their trade and capital flows.   Howell concludes that frontier markets, which trade at 13.1x earnings, are not “stretched” relative to other emerging markets that trade above 20x earnings.  As to a less commodity driven market such as Croatia, Howell points to financial services as a sector to watch, given the imment rise of credit.  That said, a genuine global recovery is still the impetus for such growth, Howell admits, and any “double dip” among more developed markets will also tend to implicate its less liquid brethren.  On the subject of Croatia, for instance, Roubini Global Economics predicts that “sluggish credit growth to the private sector will prolong recovery.”