GDP

ON EUROPE

JAPAN ONE YEAR ON

Aberdeen's global equity fund specialist Bruce Stout, manager of the £1bn Murray International trust, has warned investors should be preparing for a decade of no growth in developed economies.

Emerging markets managers have tipped Russia to soar ahead of its EM peers in 2012, driven by higher oil prices, weak valuations and Vladimir Putin's economic reforms.

After a four year hiatus, Vladimir Putin won back the Russian presidency last week. Managers debate the consequences of his victory.

JAPAN

ON NORTH AMERICA

The British Chambers of Commerce has cut its forecast for UK GDP growth for 2012 and has called for the government to announce a modest fiscal stimulus should public sector borrowing come in under target for 2011/12.

Marlborough's Giles Hargreave has reversed his notoriously bearish stance on equity markets for the first time since 2008, telling investors now is the time to be fully invested.

US GDP for the fourth quarter of 2011 has been revised up from 2.8% to 3%, the latest piece of more positive economic data to emerge from the world's largest economy.