Don't Miss Out on These Gains!

Baseball, hot dogs, apple pie, Chevrolets, and the most successful stock market annually. Of the things on this list, there's one that America can't lay claim to.

Do you know which one?

Even if you can't recall the '70s jingle ...
You could probably surmise that the good ol' US of A hasn't always been as economically successful as other countries.

What you may not know is that during the past decade, there have consistently been countries each year whose stock market performance has outshined ours.

Take a look at this chart, which shows each year's best-performing developed market:

Year	Developed Foreign Country	Foreign Country's Return	U.S. Return	U.S. Underperformance
2006	Spain	44.3%	13.2%	31.1 points
2005	Canada	28.1%	4.7%	23.4 points
2004	Austria	67.4%	8.8%	58.6 points
2003	Greece	63.2%	26.8%	36.4 points
2002	New Zealand	20.0%	(24.0%)	44.0 points
2001	New Zealand	5.6%	(13.2%)	18.8 points
2000	Switzerland	4.9%	(13.6%)	18.5 points
1999	Finland	150.7%	20.9%	129.8 points
1998	Finland	119.1%	28.8%	90.3 points
1997	Portugal	43.9%	31.7%	12.2 points

Developed countries from Stocks, Bonds, Bills, and Inflation 2007 by Ibbotson and Associates. Performance data from MSCI Indexes.

Look at 1998 and 1999. Even though the American stock market had two flourishing years, the Finnish stock market thumped it -- thanks in large part to Finland-based Nokia (NYSE: NOK), which returned nearly 1,000% during this two-year spread!

Furthermore, while America languished in a bear market from 2000 to 2002, investors could have made money by seeing the opportunities in Switzerland and New Zealand.

Overseas is the place for me ...
If you're thinking of jumping into these former winners, think again. As study after study has shown, the only thing that chasing performance will get you is poor returns. The way to make outsized returns is to find next year's investing opportunities before your investing peers do.  

Foreign markets are the playing field of Motley Fool Global Gains advisor Bill Mann and his team of analysts. And while they've done quite well recommending Asia-based companies such as New Oriental Education (NYSE: EDU) and GigaMedia (Nasdaq: GIGM), with gains of 132% and 156%, respectively, valuations are starting to look stretched. PetroChina's (NYSE: PTR) earnings multiple, for example, has expanded from 11 to 20 this year, while China Telecom's (NYSE: CHA) has increased from 13 to 20.

In fact, the entire Chinese market was up more than 120% through the end of October.

Looking south
That, however, is not true of a few Latin American countries that also stand to benefit from global economic development. Take a look:

Country	YTD Performance (Largest ADR by Market Cap)	Potential Catalyst
Argentina	9.9% (YPF (NYSE: YPF))	Increased free trade; inflation control
Brazil	45.4% (PetroBras)	Tax reform; government stability
Chile	28.3% (Enersis (NYSE: ENI))	Growth in the financial sector

Sweet success
Investors have not yet embraced these South American countries as much as they have China, but they have the potential to achieve great things.

That's why Bill Mann and his team of analysts are set to embark on a journey to these countries. They're going to be scouring corporate South America for the best investment opportunities, and you can get all of their updates live from the field by providing your email address n the box below.