As international investors' appetite for risk evaporated, the flow of capital shifted away from countries that had historically been viewed as more vulnerable, including some emerging Asian and Latin American economies, even though many of these countries appeared to be much better positioned to weather an economic crisis than in the past.
At the sectoral level, there have been problems in the commercial real estate sector, where heavy investment in recent years has led to oversupply in the market with the result that occupancy rates have fallen and many owners have not been able to generate sufficient income to service their loans.