Volatility Spurring Volumes (And Why That Might Not Be So Good For Performance) by Jennifer Thomson, Gavekal Capital Blog
As we saw earlier today, volatility has made a bit of a come back recently. And, as we might expect, that increase has made its way into the volume statistics. In fact, wherever we look around the world, 2015 looks to be on track for much higher volumes than we have seen in the last five years, rebounding from extreme lows of just one year ago.
MSCI The World Index
MSCI North America
MSCI Europe
MSCI Pacific
MSCI Emerging Markets
MSCI EM Latin America
MSCI EMEA
MSCI EM Asia
Why is the expansion of volumes important? As we can see in the following charts, upticks in volumes (blue line, left axis, inverted) have coincided with significant market weakness (red line, right axis).