Today's Major Market Move: Mongolian Stock Market Up 39% for the Year

We've mention the Venezuelan equity market several times in previous posts (here, here and most recently, here) which, thanks to the "Cancer Boom", happens to be the best performing in 2011. The next best performer after Venezuela might surprise some people, but not those thorough folks who happened to have read the title of this post. The Mongolian equity market is up a healthy 39% since the beginning of the year. Here's the list of the top performing benchmark equity indexes in 2011:

Click here to go to the live table.

This year has been a rough year for stock markets around the world. Just being in positive territory is a significant accomplishment, with only 11 of 92 benchmark equity indexes managing the feat. What is interesting about Mongolia is that it is projected to have the highest GDP growth by the IMF for the time period 2010-2015. Here's the top 10:

Click here to go to the live chart.

I think there a several reasons for a bullish outlook on Mongolia. The country benefits from a geography that has it sandwiched between two BRIC nations (Russia and China) from which it is expected to experience collateral growth. Another BRIC country (India) is not far away and there are two established industrial powers (Japan and S. Korea) in the neighborhood as well. Recent administrations have been receptive to free market reforms and have gone out of their way to attract foreign capital. Because of its growth prospects, the nickname the "Asian Wolf" has been attributed to the Mongolian economy. Let's just hope it works out better for them than another recent zoological moniker (cough, cough, "Irish Tiger", cough).