After years in the financial wilderness because of its mounting debt and widening corruption scandal, Petróleo Brasileiro is showing signs of recovery.

In late April the giant state-owned oil company issued a long-delayed fourth-quarter 2014 earnings report and sought to draw a line under its troubles by taking a 44.6 billion real ($14.1 billion) write-down for overvalued assets and an additional 6.2 billion reais for costs related to the alleged graft. “We have made our best efforts to turn the page on this sad chapter that the company has passed through,” chief executive Aldemir Bendine, who came on board in February, told reporters after the announcement.

The Egyptian Exchange roared back to life in 2013 and 2014, with its benchmark EGX 30 index doubling in the 18 months following the July 2013 coup that removed President Mohamed Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood government from power. The military-backed regime of his successor, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, cashed in on that optimistic tide last September, raising 61 billion Egyptian pounds ($8 billion) from its own population through a bond issue to finance expansion of the Suez Canal.

INSTITUTIONAL INVESTOR

APRIL 27, 2015

A Russian analyst who has monitored corporate credit for the past decade at a Big Three rating agency in Moscow still maintains the habits of the go-go years,enjoying a steak tartare lunch at a plush restaurant just off the capital’s Garden Ring, but his outlook for the country is grim — and not only in economic terms. He worries about the official media’s increasing focus on a “fifth column” supposedly seeking to undermine Russia from within, and about events like the 35,000-strong February march in Moscow, encouraged by the government, that was directed against “internal enemies.” Such efforts to stifle dissent and rally support for the government’s policies toward Ukraine could metastasize into a modern version of Stalinism, he warns.

Iran: The Next Frontier?

Bibi Netanyahu and most of the U.S. Congress may still view Iran as an axis of evil. But a few brave analysts are starting to pitch it as something else: the next great emerging market. “Iran is the largest economy in the world by far that remains cut off from global markets,” says Charles Robertson, chief economist of Renaissance Capital, a London-based investment bank that had a good run in Russia and now wants to expand across the Middle East and Africa. “It’s like Turkey, but with 9% of the world’s oil reserves.”

March 7, 2015

Sovereign wealth funds swelled to a $7 trillion investing gorilla on a rich diet of oil windfalls, so it makes sense that they would lose some punch as oil prices fall. Marc Faber, a Barron’s Roundtable member and the editor of The Gloom, Boom & Doom Report newsletter, stressed at this year’s Roundtable that a tapering of sovereign-fund earnings would undermine global demand for securities in coming years.

Investors Gear Up for Opening of Saudi Stock Market

(Institutional Investor – March 2015)

The price of oil may be depressed, but investor spirits in Riyadh are anything but. Anticipation is growing that a long-­awaited opening of the Tadawul, the Saudi stock market, to foreign investors will come as early as next month. Analysts believe the move will provide fresh momentum for the $500 billion market, which has risen by nearly 30 percent since mid­-December. “This will be the event of the year in emerging markets,” says John Sfakianakis, a veteran economist and investment strategist in Riyadh who opened an office there in September for the London-­based emerging markets specialist Ashmore Group.

Oil Dividend Proves Elusive for Emerging Markets

Shares of importers such as South Korea, Turkey, and Thailand haven’t enjoyed the expected boost from lower prices. What happened?.

By 

CRAIG MELLOW

Feb. 27, 2015 11:34 p.m. ET

Emerging Markets

It’s a common, and seemingly commonsensical, assumption these days that if oil-exporting emerging markets like Russia and Brazil have been hammered by sinking crude prices, oil-importing countries must be sailing. The hot performance of the two oil-buying BRICs, China and India, since the crash started last summer seems to cement the theory—except it doesn’t.

FEBRUARY 11, 2015

Ukraine’s Oligarchs Take to Economic Warfare

Despite his reclusive tendencies, businessman and politician Ihor Kolomoisky is trying to tip economics and diplomacy in his holdings’ favor.

By Craig Mellow (Institutional Investor)

UKRNAFTA, THE UPSTREAM OIL MONOPOLY OF WHICH THE STATE OWNS 58 PERCENT AND IHOR KOLOMOISKY’S PRIVAT GROUP OWNS A 42 PERCENT CONTROLLING STAKE. (PHOTO CREDIT: VINCENT MUNDY/BLOOMBERG)

Emerging Markets: Sizing Up Debt’s Evil Twins — Barron’s

Petroleo Brasilieiro, better known as Petrobras, and Gazprom are terribly managed companies at the heart of the less-than-brilliantly-run economies of Brazil and Russia, respectively. Both have huge debts, which have become tougher to repay, thanks to diving energy prices and internal factors — a corruption scandal that is paralyzing Petrobras, and international sanctions that are keeping Gazprom out of bond markets.

But could either of these national champions actually default? Not likely, and that may spell opportunity for fixed-income investors who can hold their governance noses. “These credits are priced at distressed levels, while we foresee that they will repay,” says Max Wolman, senior investment manager at Aberdeen Asset Management in Scotland. “We are buying selectively.”

BANKING & CAPITAL MARKETS

JANUARY 22, 2015

Most Emerging Markets Should Avoid Full-Blown Crisis in 2015

Countries such as Turkey and the Philippines will suffer less than Russia and Venezuela from the oil price crash, analysts predict.

By Craig Mellow

PHOTO CREDIT: ANDREW BURTON/GETTY IMAGES