But you're not out of luck just yet…
Many countries around the world will be able to steer around this extended recession. Some are even in prime position to explode.
And it's not as difficult to invest abroad as it may seem. Today, it's as effortless as buying an American Depositary Receipt — same thing as a stock — through your online broker. Figuring out which ones to buy is the hard part.
In Lifetime Income Report, we've ramped up our portfolio to reflect our favorites: Asia, Africa and Latin America. Today I'm letting Penny Sleuth readers in on two south-of-the-border plays you can play immediately…
Escape the Second Downturn on Lula's Coattails
Our favorite international plays come from Brazil. This probably doesn't come as a surprise. We've been bullish on Brazil for over a year now.
The Brazilian economy has never looked better. For starters, the democratic government of President Luiz Lula da Silva is both popular and smart. Instead of leading the Brazilian people down the same road they always seem to end up on — collapsing currency and enormous income disparity — Lula re-cemented the federal and state budgets, brokered trade deals across the globe, and brought the country's economy into top-ten status.
This success helped him win a landslide reelection in 2006. Even his political opponents can't discount the success he's had in making sure Brazil didn't fall into the same recession that's now captured the rest of the globe.
Sure, smaller export numbers and commodity prices have put a small hold on Brazil's growth. But by this time next year, the country's GDP should be back up to a 3.5-4% growth rate.
Lula has been able to do this by placing a little fiscal responsibility into a system that's rarely had it. It's been just 11 years since Brazil suffered from its last currency crash. Thankfully, the country adjusted its currency after that fiasco, completely taking the real off the U.S. dollar peg.
This is probably the most important reason Brazil is now starting to garner some recognition as a safe haven for growth investing.
The federal deficit and spending habits here in the U.S. can only hold for so long. Even China — the country holding more U.S. Treasury Notes than any other — recently remarked that it would like to drop the dollar as the world reserve currency.
Having a currency that's not pegged to the dollar is a huge benefit in today's inflationary world.