Forget Greece: Investors are losing money because of the slowing global economy, an international economic research group has warned.
While the world may be fixated on the fiscal and political challenges confronting Greece and the European Union, it's the $US2 trillion ($2.6 trillion) loss in the market value of China's mainland shares and tumbling sharemarkets around the world that should have investors worried and propel them into action, a report released on Thursday by Societe Generale Cross Asset Research says.
Analyst Andrew Lapthorne said losing money was "inevitable" for investors this year as high asset prices were constrained by weakening economic growth and falling company profits.
"Losing the least amount of money may be the best source of success this year," Mr Lapthorne said. "The slowing global economy is the elephant in the room."
A range of indicators revealed the slowing, he said.
The MSCI World Index has fallen 4 per cent from its 2015 peak. Half of that fall occurred in June.
Global government bonds have endured spates of sell-offs, creating their worst calendar quarter since 2013, when the US Federal Reserve began talk of winding up its quantitative easing measures such as buying bonds, which have propped up the world's biggest economy over the past six years.
"Global equity markets are finally starting to struggle a little in the face of all these mounting risks," Mr Lapthorne said.
"There is also plenty of evidence that insiders are rushing for the exits."
Societe Generale's report came less than a week after Gavekal Capital issued a stark warning about a broad equity markets correction over the past 200 days as 42 per cent of the MSCI World Index's stocks retreated more than 10 per cent off recent highs, putting them into a technical correction.
The MSCI Pacific Index featured the most stocks experiencing a correction, analyst Eric Bush said, with 46 per cent compared with North America's 43 per cent.
The MSCI Europe had just over a third of its equities, 36 per cent, in a correction.
And the number of stocks in the MSCI World Index that have entered bear market territory is also growing, with 15 per cent of shares down 20 per cent off their peaks, including nearly one in five of the index's North American stocks.
Emerging market growth is also slowing.
The International Monetary Fund warned in April that global economic growth would improve only slightly in 2015.
