Key takeaways
- This year’s global soccer tournament brings together countries with distinct strategies and styles of play and offers a good reminder for investors to consider the role that global equities may play in a diversified portfolio.
- International equities, particularly emerging markets, have posted strong gains over the past year, driven by improving fundamentals and the global AI build-out.
- We see potential for further growth as supportive macro and structural trends – such as favorable EM demographics – remain in place.
- Investors seeking efficient, low‑cost EM exposure may consider the iShares Core MSCI Emerging Markets ETF (IEMG), which offers broad access across large-, mid- and small‑cap EM equities.
As the biggest global soccer tournament kicks off across the U.S., Mexico and Canada in June, it brings together teams from across Asia, Africa, South America, Europe and Oceania. Each of the countries competing this year, from South Korea to Brazil, Australia to Sweden, is shaped by distinct strategies and styles of play. Global markets evolve in much the same way, with economies driven by different regional, sectoral, and currency dynamics. Just as fans follow teams from around the world, investors may benefit from looking beyond their home market and keeping a close eye on global equity opportunities. In particular, we believe investors may want to consider opportunities within emerging markets (EM), such as South Korea, Taiwan, Brazil and India.
Which countries should you consider for your investing starting line-up?
EM equities have built on a successful 2025 season and have continued delivering strong, broad-based performance year-to-date, with gains spread across multiple countries rather than a narrow set of winners.1 This strength has been driven by earnings per share (EPS) growth and upward revisions, not multiple expansion (Figure 1), underscoring that momentum is led by fundamentals. Looking ahead, EM equities are expected to post leading EPS growth among major regions, with forecasts around ~20% in 2026.2 To read more about our preference for emerging over developed market equities, see our Spring Investment Directions.
Figure 1 – YTD total return decomposition