Jamaica’s stock market leads the world in terms of growth, according to Bloomberg, the international finanical news outlet.

“Jamaica’s World-Beating 233% Stock Rally Continues Full Steam,” read the Bloomberg headline in a story on its site on Wednesday.

The report stated that “Jamaica’s spectacular stock market rally, the world’s biggest over the last five years, shows no sign of losing steam.”

The story measured the Jamaican stock exchange against others across the world, and was far ahead of the best.

“The Caribbean island’s benchmark index has gained 19 per cent in dollar terms this year, the most among more than 90 primary equity gauges tracked by Bloomberg. Over the last five years, its 233 per cent rally dwarfs the 86 per cent rally in the second-top performer, Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh Stock Index, and the 73 per cent rally in the S&P 500 index,” the report said.

The report also spoke highly of the island’s growth prospects, including the now-sidelined target of the Economic Growth Council.

“Jamaica’s government is targeting annual economic growth of five per cent by 2020, as billions of dollars of Chinese investment helps it upgrade ports and highways. The Caribbean island nation has slashed borrowing under an International Monetary Fund plan as it gets one of the world’s highest debt burdens under control,” the report said.

“The economy will grow two per cent this year, according to analysts surveyed by Bloomberg, the fastest pace in more than a decade. Jamaica had suffered from years of sluggish growth, weighed down by government debt of more than 100 per cent of gross domestic product,” the report said.

It is not the first time that Bloomberg has reported on Jamaica’s high-performing stock market.

On Christmas Eve 2015, Bloomberg reported that the JSE was the top-performing index for that year — topping 92 markets tracked by the global financial research company. While the Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped about one per cent that year and the Euro Stoxx 50 lost six per cent in US dollar terms, the JSE saw a 90 per cent surge in 2015 based on “foreign acquisitions, stronger investor safeguards and a rebounding economy”, Bloomberg said in it article a the time.

The resultng headlines were used by the then Government to promote the effectiveness of its economic managment during the 2016 elections.

— Richard Browne