Oil prices in EM currency terms are already as bad as they were in 2008

The surging price of oil might not seem too bad in USD terms, but the situation is already as bad as 2008 in EM currency terms, David Fickling writes in a separate piece for Bloomberg. “With emerging market currencies falling against the greenback, the rising USD price of crude is compounded for consumers in less wealthy countries.” This gap helps explain the internal policies in many EM countries — including Brazil, Venezuela, and India — where governments have been doling out bns each year in oil subsidies to appease consumers, which further burdens state budgets and feeds into the “vicious cycle” when currencies slip.