Known unknowns and Asia's decoupling from Wall Street

FOR decades, it has been a market truism that when Wall Street sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold. There may have been short periods when this dependent relationship did not apply but these would have been very few and far between - by and large, big swings in the world's leading equity market will quickly manifest in Asia.

With the election of the unpredictable and volatile Donald Trump as the 45th US president, this may very well change, and change permanently. In fact, it may already be happening - Wall Street has rallied non-stop since the election on hopes of increased fiscal stimulus and government spending but emerging markets, after an early knee-jerk response, have slipped backwards, apparently decoupled from Wall Street's usual guidance.

In the above paragraph, the operative word is "unpredictable" - by now readers would know that all countries around the world are wondering if Mr Trump will live up to his pre-election promises in their totality or whether he will scale them back partially to make them more palatable for the majority of countries with dealings with the US.