Five Good Questions: Marko Dimitrijevic – Frontier Investor

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Marko Dimitrijevic is the founder and chairman of Volta Global, a private investment group in venture capital, private equity, real estate, and public markets.  Marko Dimitrijevic has more than 35 years investing experience and has founded and managed two investment management companies with over $3 billion in assets.  He is the author of Frontier Investor: How to Prosper in the Next Emerging Markets.  Marko is a pioneer in conducting on-the-ground due diligence, particularly in frontier markets.

Marko Dimitrijevic – Frontier Investor

Audio Podcast:

Five Good Questions:  

  1. Can you give us a feel for how bad the home country bias is, and why it exists?
  2. Let’s talk about some execution details.  Aside from a passport, how do you research frontier markets?  Would an individual’s best bet be country specific ETFs?  What are your thoughts about hedging currency risk?
  3. Which investment style pairs best with frontier market investing?  Deep value, GARP, activist something else?
  4. What’s the story of the evolution of Singapore and how does it illustrate the success of frontier market investing?  Where’s the next Singapore?
  5. Economic progress has typically followed the pattern of farming to manufacturing to service / knowledge economy.  Is it possible that the disruption of robots and AI which are already displacing human labor will make it impossible for frontier countries to gain a foothold on the ladder?

Marko’s Book Recommendation:

Payoff: The Hidden Logic That Shapes Our Motivations (TED Books) by Dan Ariely

Marko Dimitrijevic: Frontier Investor – Description

Frontier Investor: How to Prosper in the Next Emerging Markets by Marko Dimitrijevic

Where are the next decade’s greatest investment opportunities? In today’s undiscovered emerging markets: the frontier markets. These markets account for 71 of the world’s 75 fastest-growing economies and 19% of the world’s GDP–yet many investors largely ignore them. Fueled by access to technology and information, frontier markets are emerging even faster than their predecessors, making them an essential component of a globally diversified portfolio.

Nobody understands frontier markets better than Marko Dimitrijevi?, and in Frontier Investor, he shows through colorful case studies, compelling charts, and fascinating travel anecdotes that it is not only possible but prudent to invest in these unfamiliar and undervalued markets. Dimitrijevi? explains how frontier markets like Nigeria, Panama, and Bangladesh are poised to follow a path similar to countries like China, India and Russia that were considered exotic two decades ago. He then details a strategy for how and where to invest–directly or indirectly–to profit from frontier’s growth. Dimitrijevi? covers the political and other risks of investing in these markets, the megatrends that promise exciting investment opportunities in the coming years, and the prospects for countries beyond the frontier such as Myanmar, Cuba, and even Iran.

Frontier Investor opens up a whole new world, and world view, to the broad investing public.

Marko Dimitrijevic: Frontier Investor – Review

Frontier Investor is terrific. This book is great for anyone interested in investing in the next frontier. It is also excellent for those who want to understand the growth potential and human consequences for these many diverse countries and their people. It is really brilliant and a tour de force. (Michael Spence, winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize in Economics)

A must-read for cutting-edge investors. (Marek Belka, president of the National Bank of Poland and former prime minister of Poland)

A brilliant and entertaining book that teaches the why, how, and where to invest in the new emerging markets. Dimitrijevic is the grand master of frontier markets investing. Read this book. (Tony Robbins, best-selling author of Money, Master the Game: 7 Simple Steps to Financial Freedom)

A fascinating primer for the investor, businessman, diplomat, or anyone else with an interest or duty to perform in the world’s rapidly emerging ‘frontier’ nations and markets. Dimitrijevic’s message, deftly delivered through a combination of insightful statistics, entertaining vignettes, and hard-won personal experience, comes through clearly: ‘Do your homework and think broadly to understand the forces at play.’ A must-read guidebook to the world’s changing economic landscape. (General Stanley McChrystal, (ret.), former commander, Joint Special Operations Command, and senior fellow, Yale University’s Jackson Institute for Global Affairs)

Marko Dimitrijevic writes about a fascinating topic with the depth that only someone who has done it for years can have. Frontier Investor tells stories of success and failure?much of it poorly appreciated, all of it insightful. Pick it up and read it. (Arminio Fraga, former president, Central Bank of Brazil and founder, Gávea Investimentos)

An inspiring point of view. Dimitrijevic’s experiences across Europe, Asia, and Latin America make him ideally suited to tackle the investment challenges of this rapidly changing world. (Aleksander Kwasniewski, former president of Poland)

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