Multi-Asset World Cup 2018: The knock out round

With only 16 teams remaining out of the 32 group-stage contenders, the next matches will whittle the competition down to just four semi-finalists; see who is economically excellent and who flunks at the final financial whistle.

This is the second of our three articles on the Multi-Asset World Cup, an international tournament with just as much excitement as the FIFA contest and perhaps even more controversy. Read our first piece, in which we explain the rules and play out the group stage here.

In terms of footballing prowess, it was a surprise to see Brazil and Argentina drop out of our competition at the group stage, but given the economic misery endured by the former, especially over the past few years, the results didn’t shock our more fiscally focused pundits.

Less surprising on both the footballing and economic side was John Roe’s Iranian team finishing last in group B. Roe is the oil expert within the Asset Allocation team and, therefore, Iran seemed like a perfect match, alas; it wasn’t to be.

Mexico are worth a special mention. They came into the tournament with a lot of promise with highly regarded German native and manager, Lars Kreckel. The equity market represents value relative to the rest of emerging markets, in his view; the economy is recovering; and much of the-market unfriendly rhetoric from AMLO, the country’s far-left presidential candidate1, is priced in – yet they couldn’t win one game in the group stages.

Kreckel was in contention for the German national role but turned down the position due to the lure of the Mexican team. You feel this year’s World Cup simply came too early for the Mexico and in four years they might be much stronger. The good news is that the experienced Kreckel intends to stay in the role.

“As long as Mexico want me, I want Mexico,” he proclaimed profusely (puzzlingly in German) to the local Mexican radio station.

A number of countries progressed with three victories out of three in the early matches, with Nordic trio Denmark, Sweden, Iceland yet to concede a goal.

But as new economic and financial criteria are drawn, will the same teams find favour or will the tide turn to favour those from warmer climes?