Risk Assessment:Gauging the Potential Overseas Pitfalls

Japanese companies are strong,said Geoff Lewis,senior strategist at Manulife Asset Management.We are seeing stocks that we like in Japan.We can still see reason to invest in the Japanese market.They have managed to stabilise.*
The cyclical indicator is showing improvement in the emerging markets,including Brazil.*
The polls on the UK Brexit issue are very,very close.I think for the UK the question is,will the City of London financial centre suffer,lose its allure if the UK leaves the European Union?I think the City will continue to function even if there is a Brexit,Mr.Lewis reassured.*
Manulife is a Canadian full line financial services company.Besides Canada and the world's biggest economies of China,Japan and the US,where it owns the John Hancock brand,it operates in promising Asian economies such as Hong Kong,Taiwan and Singapore.*
iShares Japan ETF (EWJ),iShares Emerging Markets ETF (EEM),Manulife Financial Corp(MFC)

Final Overseas 2008 Results

Results are now in for foreign stock markets for 2008.Argentina was down 49.89;Germany was off 40.37,while London fell 31.33.Hong Kong dropped 48.27;Japan lost 42.12,and Singapore fell 49.17.Brazil lost 41.22,and Shanghai was down 69.69.London fared best with its 31.33 decline.

Special Access:With the Prime Minister

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown recently addressed the Lord Mayor's banquet in the City of London,the British financial centre.These last weeks and months will be studied by generations to come,the prime minister predicted.They will be seen as a time when one chapter ended,and another began.To us falls the challenge of leading Britain through the first financial crisis of the new global age.The range,complexity and impact of these forces have shaped the steps we're taking to the new global society.