WHAT has Southeast Asia's economic crisis done for foreign investment in the relatively stable, big markets of India and the mainland? Not very much, according to the experts. India and the mainland, both comparatively unscathed by the regional crisis, have not particularly benefited either, they believe.
For one, both countries have been tarred with the same brush as the Southeast Asian economies.
'Asia as a whole is being viewed by international investors as a pariah,' Callum Henderson, currency analyst at MMS International, said.
Even equity market investors, who see the mainland and India as safe havens where growth is unaffected, have not actually poured money into those markets.
'If you are a US punter, and you look at all of Asia, it looks a mess and more of the funds go back home,' one investment banker said.
This is hardly surprising, if results of the Morgan Stanley Asia-Pacific Index are anything to go by.
Even the region's best performers - Taiwan (down 6.3 per cent on the index), Hong Kong (-23.3 per cent) - suffered negative growth and five of the nine countries in the index suffered declines of more than 60 per cent, led by Indonesia (-74.1 per cent) and then followed by Thailand (- 73.4 per cent), Malaysia (-68 per cent), South Korea (-66.7 per cent) and the Philippines (-62.6 per cent).