At The Money: Better Results By NOT Investing with Dictators!

The podcast explores the concept of freedom-weighted investing in emerging markets, contrasting it with traditional market capitalization-weighted approaches. Perth Tolle, founder of the Life and Liberty Indexes and creator of the Freedom 100 EM Index (FRDM), explains how her fund screens emerging market countries based on political, civil, and economic freedoms, using the Human Freedom Index. This approach aims to avoid investing in authoritarian regimes like China and Russia, where companies may prioritize state interests over investor returns. Tolle argues that these countries often underperform and pose risks due to government interference and surveillance. The discussion highlights Russia's exclusion from the FRDM index prior to its market collapse following the invasion of Ukraine, illustrating the potential benefits of freedom-weighted investing.