With so many developed market central banks employing some form of quantitative easing, be it bond buying or negative interest rates, with mixed results, some global market observes believe some central banks lack credibility.
Some might even say the Federal Reserve, with its continuing implications that rates here will rise without a rate hike to this point in 2016, is one of those central banks. In what may come as a surprise to some investors, Russia is home to a central bank that has been widely lauded by global market participants.
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Perhaps that explains why the VanEck Vectors Russia ETF (NYSEArca: RSX) and the iShares MSCI Russia Capped Index Fund (NYSEArca: ERUS) are among the best-performing single-country emerging markets exchange traded funds (ETFs) this year. RSX, the oldest and largest Russia ETF trading in the U.S., is higher by almost 27% year-to-date.
“Since officially taking the reins of the Russian central bank in 2013, Elvira Nabiullina has taken aggressive action, which included hiking interest rates, and allowing the Ruble to float freely, which has in turn held down inflation. According to the central bank, these measures have led to a drop in the inflation rate as of September 12 to 6.6% year-over-year, and they expect that number to keep falling until it reaches their target of 4% by the end of 2017,” reports ETF Daily News.