Investment comment
April 2009
Economic and market background
Investors' nerves remained frayed during the first quarter of 2009, with reports of persistent weakness in the global economy and evidence of deteriorating corporate earnings tending to overshadow attempts by hyperactive policymakers to ease economic and financial-market strains. Fresh unease derived from the worsening outlook for the emerging economies of Eastern Europe (whose currencies depreciated rapidly), from fears that Chrysler and General Motors would fall into bankruptcy, and from apprehension about the increasing propensity of major corporations to reduce their dividend payments to shareholders.
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