This time it's different

Since the beginning of the year, global equity markets have staged a swift comeback, turning around the dismal performance of the final quarter of 2018. Year-to-date, the MSCI World is up almost 16% in US dollar terms and 17% in euro terms1. Notably, all major regional equity markets have kept up this pace, with the US just marginally ahead. The obvious laggard has been Japan, where an unfavorable USD/JPY exchange rate also contributed to the underperformance.