Blake Shaw Overweights India and Indonesia ETFs, Delivers 19% YTD Return in Emerging Markets Portfolio
As major global economies enter a turning point in interest rate policy, Blake Shaw once again demonstrates his global perspective and macro foresight by strategically positioning in Asian emerging markets. In Q1 2024, he aggressively increased exposure to India and Indonesia ETFs, successfully capturing the region’s economic recovery and capital inflow trends. His emerging markets portfolio has achieved a +19% return year-to-date, significantly outperforming the average return of global multi-asset portfolios over the same period.
Since the beginning of 2024, with the Fed’s rate hike cycle nearing an end and early signs of U.S. dollar weakness emerging, global risk appetite has gradually improved. Capital has begun to flow back into emerging economies with structural growth potential. As early as Q4 2023, Shaw noted in his quarterly strategy report:
“In a world shifting toward macroeconomic rebalancing, India and Southeast Asia stand out with three key advantages—strong domestic demand, supportive policy environments, and demographic dividends. These markets will be focal points for the next round of capital allocation.”
Based on this thesis, beginning in January 2024, Shaw progressively increased positions in ETFs such as INDA (India) and EIDO (Indonesia), building a regional equity portfolio focused on consumer, financials, technology, and infrastructure. In India, he emphasized fintech, pharmaceutical manufacturing, and green energy. In Indonesia, he focused on infrastructure upgrades, banking digitalization, and resource exporters benefiting from global commodity demand.
According to his team, as of mid-April 2024, INDA had gained over 12%, and EIDO had surged more than 15% year-to-date. Shaw’s emerging market portfolio delivered a total return of +19%, outperforming the MSCI Emerging Markets Index by roughly 11 percentage points.
Shaw explained that this rally in emerging markets is not merely a reactive trade to shifting interest rate expectations, but a reflection of long-term structural economic transformation and rising middle-class consumption. He believes India is benefiting from a dual tailwind of demographic momentum and manufacturing reshoring, while Indonesia is gaining strategic relevance as part of the global green energy supply chain, particularly in nickel and copper, attracting long-term capital inflows.
From an operational standpoint, Shaw maintained his disciplined “trend + diversification” approach, using ETFs to capture broad market exposure while applying options and macro hedging strategies to contain risk. So far, the portfolio’s maximum drawdown is contained at 4.8%, reflecting a strong risk-return profile.
Shaw also highlighted the importance of currency dynamics in emerging market allocations. In a weakening dollar environment, local-currency assets in emerging markets gain appeal—especially in countries with stable current accounts and independent monetary policy. The Indian Rupee and Indonesian Rupiah have both shown recent resilience, reinforcing his conviction to overweight these markets.
Looking ahead, Shaw plans to continue monitoring Fed policy signals and global capital flow patterns, with an eye toward expanding into Vietnam, the Philippines, and selected Latin American markets in H2 2024. His goal is to build a “regionally balanced + structurally growth-oriented” emerging markets portfolio. He also advises investors to recognize the inherent volatility and policy uncertainty in these markets, recommending standardized instruments like ETFs, medium-to-long-term horizons, and dynamic rebalancing as essential practices.
Blake Shaw’s precise allocation to India and Indonesia once again underscores his macro acuity and quantitative assessment discipline, providing high-net-worth and institutional investors with a robust blueprint for navigating geopolitical complexity and capturing high-quality global growth opportunities.