Valuations offer opportunities in flagging US

ON NORTH AMERICA

SIMON LAING, portfolio manager of Newton American fund on North America

It is hard to be upbeat about the outlook for the US economy. GDP growth in 2011 looks likely to be around 2%, well below what would be expected after the depth of recession the US went through in 2009, and certainly below what the Fed would like to see. The main drag on the economy continues to be the effect of consumer and government de-leveraging and this is a multi-year phenomenon. Unemployment remains high and until business confidence returns, there is unlikely to be much improvement. To date, the level of corporate investment has been very disappointing. The anti-business po...