Below we highlight the year to date performance of the main equity indices for the 20 largest countries in the world (based on market caps). As shown, Europe's big three (Italy, Germany, France) have been nothing short of disasters in 2011. France is down 25.4%, Germany is down 27.4%, and Italy is down 32.8%. On the other hand, the decline here in the US of 9.1% year to date doesn't look all that bad when compared to the rest of the world.
Below is a more expanded list of 2011 stock market performance by country. While Italy is at the bottom of the list above, two other countries have done even worse -- Greece (-39.76%) and the Ukraine (-41.29%). Of the BRICs, China now leads the way with a 2011 decline of 11.05%. Russia is down 12.21%, while Brazil and India are both down roughly 20%.
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