Full brunt of crisis yet to be felt

The sharp fall of the Chinese stock market last week was a shock only to the overly optimistic investors who believed that the economic stimulus efforts by governments of both developed and emerging economies were the magic pill for recessionary woes.

To be sure, share prices have stabilized since last Thursday and the key indicator did make some gains in the past several trading sessions. But the troubles of the global economy are far from over and their full impact on the economies of emerging markets is yet to be felt.

Many economists have been warning about what they dubbed "the second wave" of the unfolding financial crisis. Their notion has been reinforced by the unexpectedly poor 4th quarter results of some of the world's most prominent financial institutions.