In any case, Hakham argues that after such a torrid time for emerging markets, 'your downside is limited'. That is not to say investors should bet the ranch. You have to be selective and concentrate on parts of the asset class where you believe people are doing the right thing,' Hakham says. In practice, private investors have little choice but to invest in emerging markets through collective vehicles - unit and investment trusts and Oeics. It is too difficult to monitor these markets closely from afar and too expensive to deal there.
Collective vehicles are also able to use their size to diversify, reducing risk.
Investment trusts are the more obvious play - emerging market sentiment has been such that the shares of many good trusts are currently trading on discounts to the value of their assets of more than 20 per cent. As sentiment improves further, those discounts should narrow, ratcheting up returns. Unit trusts and Oeics, on the other hand, are always priced at asset value, though this does mean you will not incur extra losses if markets fall. The choice with both unit and investment trusts is between global emerging market funds and regional, or even single-country specialists. The table on page 41 shows the best-performing general funds while top specialists are identified throughout the rest of this report.