Chief Economist & Political Strategist, CrossASEAN Research

Prasenjit K. Basu

PK Basu has 34 years experience covering Asia's economies and markets (equities, fixed income and currencies), including 20 years covering the global economy. He was Chief Economist (SE Asia & India) at Credit Suisse First Boston for 5 years, and Chief Asia (x-Jpn) Economist at Daiwa Securities for a similar period. Among other roles, he was global head of research at Maybank Kim Eng, Malaysia equity research head and chief ASEAN economist at Macquarie, Chief Economist at ICICI Securities, ASEAN economist at UBS and the first chief economist at Khazanah Nasional (where he was co-head of research, and led all agri-business initiatives). PK Basu started his career in the Asia Service of WEFA (Wharton Econometrics) in Philadelphia in 1990, rising to be Director of their Asia Service in June 1994. 
PK's book, "Asia Reborn: A continent rises from the ravages of Colonialism and War to a New Dynamism" won the Tata Literature First Book Award (non-fiction) for 2018. It is the first single chronicle of the modern economic and political history of the whole of Asia (from Iraq and Turkey to Korea and Japan, and everything in between), told from an Asian perspective.

Chief Economist & Political Strategist

Constitutional Coup Could Pave the Way to Faster Economic Growth Despite External Debt Challenge

Staying with the IMF Program Entails Sluggish Growth, and the Uncertain Promise of Future Gains

Sri Lanka: Struggling to Avert Being The "Next Argentina" Amid Unsustainable Debt

Sri Lanka in 2018-2019: Improved Macroeconomic Picture to Support Discounted Stock Market

Chart of the Day: The Beautiful South (Asia)

REAL-Economics.com

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

<p><strong>Sri Lanka appears cheap among frontier and emerging markets, trading at a P/E multiple of slightly below 11x. But its growth potential remains anaemic by comparison with emerging markets (leave alone such frontier-market stars as Vietnam and Bangladesh). Real GDP growth last year was a dismal 3.2% (with growth slumping to just 1.4% YoY in 4Q 2017), the current account deficit widened to 2.7% of GDP, and the public debt (more than half of which is foreign-currency denominated) remains close to</strong>…</p>

Sri Lanka appears cheap among frontier and emerging markets, trading at a P/E multiple of slightly below 11x. But its growth potential remains anaemic by comparison with emerging markets (leave alone such frontier-market stars as Vietnam and Bangladesh). Real GDP growth last year was a dismal 3.2% (with growth slumping to just 1.4% YoY in 4Q 2017), the current account deficit widened to 2.7% of GDP, and the public debt (more than half of which is foreign-currency denominated) remains close to…

Sri Lanka: Political Turmoil Clouds Economic Prospects Despite Progress with IMF-Led Reform