For a long time, the phrase “emerging market investing” pretty much meant investing in China. But that’s not the case anymore – not by a long shot. Now, the focus has shifted to places like India and Saudi Arabia. And other opportunities and challenges are coming into view across the emerging market landscape too.
Amy Oldenburg, the head of emerging market equity at Morgan Stanley, dropped by the Finimize studio recently to chat with our own Carl Hazeley about the opportunities and the challenges out there, and the investing approach she’s taking now.
Listen in the Finimize app, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Partner with us: https://business.finimize.com/
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For a long time, the phrase “emerging market investing” pretty much meant investing in China. But that’s not the case anymore – not by a long shot. Now, the focus has shifted to places like India and Saudi Arabia. And other opportunities and challenges are coming into view across the emerging market landscape too.
Amy Oldenburg, the head of emerging market equity at Morgan Stanley, dropped by the Finimize studio recently to chat with our own Carl Hazeley about the opportunities and the challenges out there, and the investing approach she’s taking now.
Listen in the Finimize app, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Partner with us: https://business.finimize.com/
Subscribe To Finimize Newsletter: https://finimize.com/
Finimize Studio (00:02.194)
Amy, welcome to the Finimize podcast.
Amy Oldenburg (00:06.621)
Carl, thanks so much. Happy to join you today.
Finimize Studio (00:10.206)
I think it makes the most sense to start right in the middle of emerging markets, which is where you spend an awful lot of your time. How would you describe the landscape for emerging markets focused investors right now?
Amy Oldenburg (00:24.285)
Sure, well, first of all, I have to say, I'm just grateful that you're interested in emerging markets and that you want to talk about this topic because I have to say the last 10 years has really been a challenge for the space, as I know you're aware. So we do think we're moving into a bit of a different era here, but it has been a hard grind forward. And I think for every investor on our team, it really does feel like we're working for every dollar at this point.
There's a lot to keep track of. We have over 75 countries that are going to the polls this year. So a lot of different things to consider, not to mention just the number of variables that we're dealing with across the world. If it's commodities, if it's unrest across the world.
or even the amount of data that we're consuming, not to mention the headlines that definitely leave no shortage of distraction for investors. So that's been pretty challenging overall, I would say, for the EM marketplace. But that being said, it's a bit of a tale of two stories, I would say, as dedicated EM investors, when we're on the ground, there's a lot of excitement in many of these markets, and it is our job to try to come back and translate that into the portfolios
communicate that to investors. So I would say we're quite excited about the outlook and think that there's a couple of good entry points here that will be presented to us, but it's not an easy sell right now. There's a lot of education to do and really talk about this new era of emerging markets that we're presented with.
Finimize Studio (01:58.838)
Yeah, that's a very good point. And maybe picking up on that new era, you were talking just before we started recording about Japan and its interest rate hike and entering a new era globally in developed markets as well. Touched on data, that's obviously something that developed markets spend a lot of time on and thinking about whether it's chat GPT or Nvidia and all the knock-on effects that naturally...
impact emerging markets. So we'll get into where we see opportunities in a moment, but maybe just to help set the scene for our listeners, because you know, cynically you might say that historically investing in emerging markets was essentially a play on China. It was a, you know, a leveraged China bit. And we're now in a world where China's gone from growing 10 percent a year to 8 percent a year.
now, you know, circa 5% a year, or around 5% a year. I said circa just because there's no legal definition for circa, so 1% would still be circa 5%. Is, you know, is China's slow? The asset class has suffered, struggled. You know, you mentioned this, getting investors excited about EMs has been a challenge. Is the leverage play on China a fair assessment, or, you know, how are those conversations going?
Amy Oldenburg (03:07.506)
Right.
Amy Oldenburg (03:28.717)
It's a good point and it's important. It's an important one to talk about because if you look over the last two decades, you're right. A lot of the story, a lot of the narrative was driven by that growth in China. No question. If you think back to when everybody used to throw around the acronym BRICS, I will just personally say BRICS right now is dead. That is not a term we should be using in emerging markets to define the opportunity set whatsoever.
dealing with a different landscape. Even I think when we talk about EM not doing well, that is in relation to as we define the asset class by the index returns. And I think that's really important to look at because we were in an era and at one point even we were getting so uncomfortable as the China marketplace was continuing to increase China A share exposure within the index.
and we were moving up to an index that was close to 40% exposure to China. So to your point about it being a proxy for China, there was probably some truth to that because China made up so much of the index. That being said, the last couple of years have really driven the story in a very different direction. We've seen this correction happen in China.
the index weight has significantly decreased more than 17% since 2020. And we're now starting to get a more balanced index to look at.
I think even when you look at some of the returns across emerging markets, you saw many of the EM markets even outperform the US last year. But some of that gets hidden because so much of the narrative around EM has really been defined by China. And now we're starting to get the definition of, okay, if not China, let's talk about India. So a lot of what we do is talk about India these days. If China's say you even have some of the headlines that pop up that say China is uninvestable,
Amy Oldenburg (05:30.371)
I would not agree with that headline.
Finimize Studio (05:32.61)
That would be a very extreme set of views. I think there's still a lot to be said for China, although it's certainly tougher, like you said. Okay, I will come on to India next, but I do just want to get your two cents on the outlook for China. It's come up a lot, but it is still a huge, in the context of its five-ish percent growth target and the economic challenges it faces, you know, not least in-
Amy Oldenburg (05:54.435)
Mm-hmm.
Finimize Studio (06:02.55)
real estate, what's your view on that market? How should we be thinking about that kind of thing?
Amy Oldenburg (06:09.725)
I think the one thing that we have to think about with China, it is absolutely going through a transition. I mean, the amount of growth that they've seen, they're just the amount of transformation that they've experienced as a country in the last 70 years is quite historic, just in terms of moving from a rural country.
in terms of agricultural led economy to an urban powerhouse around manufacturing technology and other industries. And with that, they really have to, they're in a different stage of growth. Now you mentioned 5% growth.
Amy Oldenburg (06:47.573)
There's always questions around where that number settles. I don't think we have to focus too much on that. There's no question that there's opportunities there, but it's highly selective. We really focus on this concept of China 3.0. They're very strong in areas like 5G.
green energy, quantum computing, biotech. There's some areas that are definitely quite interesting. Even EV cars, six of the top 10 EV car makers in the world are based in China. But that being said, less than a third of that China index actually has exposure to those opportunities. So I think the real question here is how do you get active exposure to China? And that's one of the things that I do have a background.
After studying accounting and finance early in my career, I went back for a psychology degree, trying to understand how we can apply psychology to understand some of these behaviors. But interestingly enough, one of the things that I see in the market is the safety trade is to go to passive EM exposure. We've seen a big uptake in passive investment. But that being said, you're getting higher exposure to China than most active managers have in that country right now.
So it really is, and of course I may be biased, we are active managers, but that said, there's very much a very strong rationale for why you need to be quite selective and that the index really isn't giving you the exposure that you want for the forward-looking perspective on China.
Finimize Studio (08:21.595)
I think unless you're being super selective with those passive funds, you're not going to get those pockets of excitement.
Amy Oldenburg (08:30.439)
Right.
Finimize Studio (08:31.847)
But yeah, you rightly said people are looking away from China a bit and more towards India, more than a billion people, exciting demographics, going to the polls this year, as you rightly said. What is it about India that excites you? What's getting investors out of bed for India? Maybe just talk through the opportunities you've seen.
Amy Oldenburg (08:57.405)
Sure. I've personally been going to India since about 2003. And our team has been based there for quite a while. We've had a dedicated team there since the late 80s and products for investors since the early 90s. So we've clearly seen this transition happen on the ground. And every time that you go back, even if it's six months, you see just a dramatic change in terms of the step up effect that's happening.
The infrastructure spending that's going on now, something that we actually haven't seen historically has definitely picked up. The services industry, so they're clearly, I think COVID really accelerated that. The global centers that are based in some of these cities in India, if it's outside of Mumbai, if it's Bangalore, Chennai, there's major hubs now and any global corporate around the world.
likely has a center of excellence that's based there in India, and that's been growing quite dramatically. So we're seeing a lot of these different tailwinds really help support this opportunity in India. Not to mention as the GDP per capita continues to creep up, you are seeing a relatively healthy consumer, you're seeing different value opportunities as they continue to formalize in the space.
And some of the digitization trends within India are super exciting. They have this Adahar, which is the ID system for all Indians. I have to say, when you're on the ground and you try it out, I wonder why we don't have that here in the US. Hopefully, someday we will have some of this technology that makes things easy to get the.
digital ID executed on because you can just see this Indian tech stack that they're really building is quite exciting and they're doing it on a population of over a billion people. The opportunity there is definitely quite great.
Finimize Studio (10:58.366)
That's cool. I didn't realize that Morgan Stanley had been in India since the 80s and available with vegetable products since the 90s. And I promise, this isn't a shameless plug, but why I think that's interesting is when we speak to our members about India, one of the things that comes up is it's really difficult to invest in the Indian opportunity.
And what I didn't realize is I could just say, well, what if the Sanity Investment Management has funds that can give you exposure? And I'm not just saying that because you're here.
Amy Oldenburg (11:35.941)
Yeah, we've had dedicated funds for a long time. And I think that's the thing that we really have focused on just as a team, is really being able to provide the exposure to the investors and also the solutions that they need. So I think that's one of the things, and we'll talk about that later. But just the variation of ways that you can get exposure to EM now is growing. And that really is to meet some of the client demands that we're seeing that varies dramatically from, say,
investor to European investor and sometimes even the investors in say Asia, Middle East or Latin America that have different needs.
Finimize Studio (12:13.966)
Absolutely. Look, we could spend this entire podcast going through emerging market by emerging market. Brazil's interesting, Mexico's interesting, but one more I wanted to touch on before we switch gears is Saudi Arabia, which, depending on perspective, is emerging, has already emerged. It's sort of in that interesting mid-tier, and it's interesting because it's sort of shifting its economy, and it reminds me of China going from...
industrial economy to a consumer-focused economy. And of course, in Saudi Arabia's case, it's around going from an oil-driven and energy-driven economy to trying to diversify outside of oil and energy. I guess the question is, how should investors be thinking about that shift in Saudi Arabia? And what opportunities is it creating for an active manager like yourself?
Amy Oldenburg (13:13.549)
I find the Saudi Arabian market very exciting to explore. We have a team that's based in Riyadh that's been there since 2009. So we've seen it pre this transformation and have been investing locally and then post the transformation kickoff and the Vision 2030.
And one of the things that I would say is the biggest challenge for myself and my team is just getting people to take a look and understand what's happening there. You mentioned a comparison to China. I do think there are some elements of that are there. But there's also something that's a little different where there's a heritage there that
runs very strong in terms of the culture in Saudi Arabia, almost more like Japan, in a way. So it's very unique in terms of how this transformation is coming together. They're investing in areas like renewable energy. The tourism industry is quite a focus for them, bringing you and others.
that you know may actually be planning a trip to their next vacation to Saudi Arabia, who would have ever thought we would be saying that. But I've done it myself and I have to say it's incredible. The history that they have there, they're really executing on it quite well. It's extremely high quality, the infrastructure is being put in place and it is-
There is funding that's coming from oil. Oil prices are high. Energy around the world is still driven more than 80% by fossil fuels. We don't think that that's changing anytime soon, even though there is a big focus in renewable energy in many places around the world. There's also just a growth.
Amy Oldenburg (15:04.769)
of energy needs that will continue to take place as you see the continued growth, even if it's only 5% in China or India or across the African continent or even places like the local region like the Middle East that's continuing to see quite an uptick.
I think even beyond that, Saudi Arabia is benefiting even from what's happened in the region. So Dubai and the UAE has been incredibly strong post-COVID. Both Saudi and UAE have eased many of their visa restrictions. So I think one thing that's quite interesting to see where many folks would move to Hong Kong or even Singapore in the past, that's not really happening anymore.
question if expats really want to settle there. Singapore is really at capacity. It's very hard to get a permanent resident card there if you're coming from another market. So where's the next best solution? It's likely the UAE. And with that comes the opportunity for expansion in the entire region. And Saudi absolutely is taking advantage of that. They're doing it in their own way. And they also have a very young population.
Some people may not know that over 60% of the population is under the age of 30 So as someone in their mid 40s as I travel around Saudi Arabia, I feel incredibly old in meetings or at malls or out to dinner at night Which is a very strange feeling. There's not many places in the world. You feel like that
Finimize Studio (16:39.202)
Yeah.
Finimize Studio (16:43.6)
It's a country full of children. It's a crash of a country. Ha ha.
Amy Oldenburg (16:48.746)
A country full of young people that are really looking for new ways to consume entertainment, interested in gaming, interested in new opportunities, and that's really playing out there, really taking advantage of that.
Finimize Studio (16:54.06)
Yeah.
Finimize Studio (17:02.158)
But yeah, the demand and I guess shopping and consumption patterns will be really interesting to see from a generational perspective. Now maybe to take a bit of a step back. So I'm an equity research analyst by training, so I love a thesis. And I'd love to understand how you approach emerging markets from a framework point of view. Now I understand that you run a lot of different emerging markets.
I understand that you run a lot of emerging market strategies, but can you maybe just give a sense of how you approach the space holistically? So is your overarching view that you have a quality bias, are you growth bias, is it something else? Income strategies are a bigger focus. Be great just to understand, because your approach to the world.
Amy Oldenburg (17:56.281)
Sure, even though our platform has evolved, there definitely are some core tenants that run through any strategy that you'll find on our platform. And as you've mentioned a few.
different ideas. The focus on quality and a focus on growth is definitely there. We're big believers if you're in the emerging markets, you're looking for growth and these countries are about growth. Even if we find more of a value-oriented opportunity, that's more of just an entry point for a long-term growth outlook that we see in the market. So there's no question
big believers of spending time on the ground.
really understanding the local story. So anyone on our team is regularly traveling to these markets, really understanding the voice of the people in the street, meeting with companies, looking the management teams in the eye, understanding their strategy, and then translating that to our global portfolios that we're managing. So it's a really critical piece, even though a lot of the data you
Amy Oldenburg (19:11.183)
value of getting on the ground, especially when stories, I think what we're seeing is the cycles continue to get shorter and shorter. When there was information asymmetries in the world and only a few people had some of the insights into some of these markets and we were still carrying around hard copy equity research reports that you probably wrote early in your career. Now everything is available to us in the snap of a finger. And, and we really can't.
Finimize Studio (19:31.31)
Good old days.
Amy Oldenburg (19:39.373)
we have to make sure that we're really watching these different trends evolve ahead of time and get positioned in the markets. So that's been a really critical piece to continue to keep up even though...
the world has changed around information gathering and so forth. We do have quite a rigorous country framework. It's applied differently to some of the strategies we have, but one of the things that we're well-known for, many of our clients continue to invest with us is because of our top-down strength. We have a very strong framework. We have a dedicated macro research team that's constantly just
Amy Oldenburg (20:21.097)
churning, we sometimes refer to them as the engine room, just really churning through some of the data, understanding the economics of these countries and helping us inform both the changes incrementally that are happening at the country level, but also trying to understand and identify some of the themes that are really playing out in some of these markets.
Finimize Studio (20:43.074)
Maybe just take that one level deeper and help our listeners understand how these things are layered in. So I guess, how does the country framework act as a screen or an overlay to the bottom-up fundamental research?
Amy Oldenburg (20:59.453)
Sure.
Sure.
I think many times people want to hear step one is country framework and step two is go to the country and execute on that. And I think the one thing that we constantly, and I see it in, in action every day on our team, uh, is the portfolio as a living breathing thing, uh, that we do manage, uh, on an ongoing basis. So I would say the top down and bottom up can inform one another. So the top down framework, most of the factors.
that we're looking at the top down, they're not going to change too much. You'll see incremental differences, but you can look at those more so on a monthly, quarterly basis, even sometimes longer term, and they're going to help you just set the direction that you're looking at. But it's that bottom up where the team really starts to put things in place. I think sometimes one of the challenges is you can't always... Sometimes you may find a theme.
that comes out in that top-down framework, but you can't find that stock that truly is going to really be able to...
Amy Oldenburg (22:14.333)
present the opportunity in the market in the same way that you can find it. As an example, at one point in the past, we were looking at an opportunity in gold. It was looking that gold was looking quite attractive on that macro side of things. And when we were looking at stocks to try to execute that, it became really difficult and the stocks just weren't translating in terms of the performance and the opportunity there. So it is an active
Amy Oldenburg (22:43.641)
process that the macro team is sitting side by side with all of the analysts and portfolio managers that are picking those stocks. The one area that I would say that has continued to get more critical for us, I mean it's always been important, but I think just in terms going back to this idea of data speed of translation.
We really have to make sure that, and we do this in all of the portfolios, entry, exit into all of the positions is really critical. Risk management of the overall portfolio. As active managers, we're not just there to pick the greatest stocks in emerging markets. We're there to actively manage that portfolio and everything that comes with that. That's trying to protect...
on the downside, say if a storm rolls through, and we have to make sure that we're on top of that, and then also really making sure that we're managing that risk and providing the risk that the client is expecting us to express within that portfolio.
Finimize Studio (23:48.738)
So maybe just as a follow up, because I guess there's a perception that a long only active manager can be quite sleepy at times. And I mean this in a kind of way, right? In that you do your work, you understand the position of the company, you understand it's, you know, you've got your three year, five year.
Amy Oldenburg (24:08.568)
I totally understand.
Finimize Studio (24:18.306)
forecasts and you're thinking long term about the growth opportunity and so the machinations of a given quarter, it's a good chance to sense check your thinking but you aren't necessarily watching the tape as the numbers cross first thing in the morning. How important is speed and being really close to news flow in a typical portfolio?
compared to, I guess, being on top of your numbers and being able to react, but allowing a short term to be what it is and responding a bit more slowly.
Amy Oldenburg (24:54.109)
Sure.
Amy Oldenburg (25:02.253)
Sure. I think your comment about long only is a little bit sleepy. Maybe that the stereotypes usually present themselves for a reason. There may have been some history there. And I think that's if we're in the era that we're living in now where passive is taking much of the flow, if it's the EM asset class or even other asset classes, if you continue to stay in the active management space.
Finimize Studio (25:13.523)
Yeah.
Amy Oldenburg (25:30.125)
you really need to be presenting an active product. And that's active in multiple ways beyond just selecting stocks relative to that index. So I think some of that has really changed. It's critical.
Everything from managing cash, right? We have to, we can't just be sloppy in terms of where the cash position is in the portfolio. We have conversations about what that exposure is. That will drag down and take away basis points from your portfolio. So every basis point matters and that's one of the things that we try to talk about.
a lot within our team overall is how do we manage and take advantage of all of the alpha that we can generate for the clients. That's why they pay us the fees that they pay us. It's our responsibility and it's our job to do that. And I think there is some of that that's changed just in terms of the dynamic that we have with passive now.
Finimize Studio (26:26.722)
That's very clear and quite a neat segue to my next question, which is around those conversations you have with clients. I guess what's probably most useful to know right now is what's the flavor of the conversation.
Amy Oldenburg (26:43.037)
Great question. And it's so much of it right now is asset allocation. I think 21, 22, as we were going through this dramatic rate change that we live through and there was quite some disruption in terms of overall portfolios of our clients. There was a moment where
It was hard to have a conversation about EM. It wasn't about EM. It was, where's my liquidity? Because I have to reallocate to fixed income. I'm off my fixed income targets. I'm getting capital calls and private equity. I'm not getting distributions from my private portfolio. And the one thing that public equity does offer is liquidity at any time, for the most part.
Finimize Studio (27:09.528)
Yes.
Amy Oldenburg (27:29.733)
So we were dealing with an element of that, as many of our peers were. But that being said, it's been a welcome conversation to see this change. It's calmed no question within the end of 2023. And we're starting to see more of a discussion around.
Where is our target to international and EM? We may be under positioned where we were. US has been incredibly strong. Is there an opportunity to start adding now to some of this exposure as we continue to see the US? The US has been strong. It's been the decade for the US market. So you know.
We actually called that on our team, our macro team at one point. And, and I remember this very vividly sitting in the office and the head of our macro research, like the U S is going to do super well for the next decade. Like, and so what do we do as EM investors? Right. So we just have to, we have, we, we knew that there was an opportunity there that was presenting itself in the market. We've lived through that. And I would say, as we look at some of the factors now.
the tailwinds for emerging markets, especially as we've had this correction in China and it's more managed in terms of the exposure and the index, we are feeling quite confident about that EM exposure going forward. And especially with the strength of the US dollar, if we do start to see the weakness there, at any given time, currency is super important to emerging market returns. And historically we've seen about a third of those EM returns come from
the currency. So we do have that opportunity there too is just one of the stars that are aligning.
Finimize Studio (29:16.634)
So a very interesting time ahead and hopefully an exciting one too. Maybe just to spend a bit of time on your overall outlook for 2024. When I read through it, one of the things that jumped out and I thought we should spend a bit of time on for our listeners is you talk about the high conviction views that underpin your investment decisions. I'd be really keen to understand a couple of those.
high conviction views and where you're placing bets.
Amy Oldenburg (29:49.009)
So...
I'd say one of the areas that we've been very focused on, and this has been something we've talked about for a while now, is the opportunity in EM outside of China. We've been very focused on that. Some of that has clearly played out and we think that story will continue. So if it's looking at countries like India, we talked a little bit about that. We're quite bullish on India for the next three to five years. Brazil and Mexico, you've seen quite a shift
manufacturing, this whole theme of friend shoring that's really playing out and presenting opportunities to markets like Mexico, even Poland, just relative to where they're positioned in the European marketplace, Poland has actually benefited from some of the manufacturing opportunities, and the markets performed really well in 2023 and we think there's still room to go in 2024.
So I think one of the things is to be very, very focused. It's not the entire index that's gonna do well. It's a number of these very select opportunities that are presenting itself. And much of that is because of this.
bit of the chairs are, the deck chairs are shifting and there's opportunities that are presenting itself in selective markets that don't typically get a lot of the attention as we talk about EM. As you mentioned earlier, typically EM, the headlines are around China or India, but very rarely do you get enough attention to capture the opportunity, say in Poland or Mexico or even Brazil, it doesn't always hit the headline.
Amy Oldenburg (31:32.947)
in the same way, but significant opportunities in many of these places. But again, just to mention India, Mexico, Brazil, Poland, definitely the top of our list.
Finimize Studio (31:46.694)
And switching gears again, this time with a handbrake turn. At the top of the podcast, we talked about being in a new era. You've seen many eras. You started your career in tech and post the dot-com bubble bursting, moved into investing and into markets. I guess it'd be great to understand a bit about how you made that transition and what transferable skills you had.
have served you well.
Amy Oldenburg (32:18.641)
So it was a bit of just a fluke that had actually worked out that way. I was an accounting major in university and they wouldn't let me study abroad. Or I would have to, I wouldn't be able to graduate in four years, but they gave me an opportunity to go to San Francisco. And this was during an era when I still had to go to a computer lab to log on to a computer. So there wasn't this vibrant Twitter, Google opportunity that you could just get any.
information at your fingertips. So when I landed in San Francisco, I was working at an internet consulting firm the first week I was there and actually swore that I would never go back to the East Coast and was really in the depths of the 1999 run-up in the tech bubble.
very much experienced all of the companies, pets.com and the rest of them that everyone knows from that era, and then also experienced the downside of that. I think living through that was just one of the most informational, educational experiences I could have had, more so than ever going to any university course.
being in the depths of that probably taught me more than I ever want to learn about some of the markets and many my friends were left with zero equity and no money as we Crested came back to the East Coast in 2001 only to experience 9-eleven And that kind of kicked off an era of crisis for quite a while But I think following those patterns really understanding what that feels like it does give I think myself
And then also when I look at others on my team, you definitely see people that are just quite resilient in being able to manage through these sort of markets. It's not so much fear that presents itself, but there's almost an excitement to try to figure out how to get through that opportunity and then take advantage of it.
Amy Oldenburg (34:17.649)
I think many people will say, you know, don't let a good crisis go to waste. There's definitely a big belief on our team that there's an opportunity there. That's not to say you won't be sick to your stomach and spend many nights up awake at night managing that. But that being said, it is something that I think many of us have learned. Some of my team members who were in emerging markets before I was.
Finimize Studio (34:31.672)
Yeah.
Amy Oldenburg (34:46.417)
While I was sitting in tech, they were dealing with the Mexican tequila crisis or the Asian financial crisis, but very much similar elements of the same thing.
Finimize Studio (34:56.27)
So is that what you'd say would make, is that what makes someone a good investor? To tease the cliche, being greedy when others are fearful, grabbing the opportunity by the scruff of the neck where, yeah, where others might be a bit nervous.
Amy Oldenburg (35:13.541)
No question. I think that's a really critical piece, specifically for EM investors. I mean, I think there's an element for all investors. But EM just has another level of challenge that I think that you have to deal with. You're dealing with cultural differences across the board. You're dealing with consumer behavior. You're dealing with different governance structures in some countries that might not be
where you grew up. So there's many different factors that are basically impacting how you're looking at these opportunities and the resilience that's required to do this. You may be highly convicted, just to give you an example, we had a team member of ours, one of our portfolios.
They felt very strongly about some of the opportunities in Russia before Russia-Ukraine opened up in the crisis that we've been watching play out for the last two years. And we've had, there were some incredible companies on the ground in Russia. There was a great FinTech that we really had not only worked out well in the portfolio, but really.
and liked the management team there too. And it's went to zero. The company, we can't invest in it anymore. We have no exposure. So that's pretty dramatic for an investor to be very highly convicted and then lose a market altogether. That's totally out of their control. And you're dealing with that again and again. It's not just gonna happen once in your career. It's likely gonna happen multiple times throughout your career.
Finimize Studio (36:48.17)
Yeah, very fair. And yeah, speaking of a career, you have been over 20 year career. You had several bosses, I imagine. Now you lead the entire emerging markets team. So what makes a good leader?
Amy Oldenburg (37:05.189)
When I think about leadership, I definitely have more of a service oriented style. I'm there to make sure that my team is okay, that they have what they need to be successful, and that everyone is really clear in terms of what their ownership is and what their path is. And I have to live that every day too. I'm a big believer that leaders have to roll up their sleeves and be on the ground, very much be
in the trenches with their teams, especially when times are challenging, but also celebrating the wins and we really try to do that. And then finally, I would just say in terms of great leaders and also what I try to also
portrayed to my team is having an open door policy and being accessible. I want people to tell me when something's not working. I want people to be able to just talk to me whenever they need to talk to me, because it's gonna be the best way for me to help lead the team. I don't wanna lead in darkness. So it's critical for me.
to make sure that my team is 100% comfortable with reaching out and presenting whatever they need to present, good and bad, in my office or on the phone whenever they need to do that.
Finimize Studio (38:23.206)
Amy, we are almost at the end, but I want to squeeze in a few lightning round questions. So short, sharp answers. What was your first investment?
Amy Oldenburg (38:35.301)
First investment was in my middle school, Steinrow Young Investor Funds. Totally changed my life in terms of focused on investing at a young age.
Finimize Studio (38:48.387)
What was the worst investment you've made if you don't mind sharing?
Amy Oldenburg (38:53.253)
So I'm going to say there's no bad investment. I think even those investments that didn't work out for you, massive learning opportunity, you will never forget those and you will always walk away more informed and knowledgeable than you did before that. That has value in it, even if you didn't make money on the position.
Finimize Studio (39:12.706)
Fair enough. But I'm therefore not going to ask you what the best investment was. Which investor out there do you admire the most?
Amy Oldenburg (39:23.321)
So I'm breaking down all your lightning round questions. I actually am a non-believer in creating any gurus or investors where they actually, there's a religion that evolves around it. I'm not a believer in that. I think it's quite dangerous. So I would say I'm quite inspired by all of my peer investors in the emerging market space. I think it takes a huge amount of commitment
and I'm inspired by all of them that I am friends with and colleagues with and have been part of that group for over 20 years.
Finimize Studio (40:04.943)
And maybe what's the, is there a single piece of advice, investing advice that you'd like to share with our listeners that maybe you wish someone told you at the start of your career?
Amy Oldenburg (40:16.017)
really get comfortable with risk. So I think especially in emerging markets, and I think I try to present this to all of even our young investors on the team, really understand what your risk tolerance is and really try to push yourself on a regular basis to understand what that means. So I think just the concept of risk, comfort with risk, it's a really critical piece of any investment.
Finimize Studio (40:17.995)
Okay.
Amy Oldenburg (40:43.673)
I'm a big believer that the marketplace right now is constantly either presents too much risk hidden as it's not risk in the market or isn't giving investors enough risk to really return what they need to for long term performance, say for retirement and so forth. So definitely a big focus on risk.
Finimize Studio (41:07.236)
So feel the fear and do it anyway. Cool, and we spent a lot of time talking about Morgan Stanley's emerging markets offering, how you approach the space. Where can people go to find out more about funds on offer, the work you do, and...
Amy Oldenburg (41:26.477)
Morganstanley.com, we have an investment website that's focused on investment management, all of our products and strategies, and our team is there. We also post quite actively to LinkedIn. We love to get different insights, especially when we're on the ground in these markets and share those. So please feel free to follow myself or any of my colleagues. We really try to educate as much as we do
advice for areas around the emerging markets.
Finimize Studio (42:00.842)
education is at the heart of what we do. So that sounds perfect for our members. Amy Ordenberg, thank you very much for joining the Philomise Podcast.
Amy Oldenburg (42:04.765)
Great.
Amy Oldenburg (42:09.509)
Thank you.