China — predicted to pass the U.S. as the world’s top retail market in 2018 — is back on top as the leading emerging market for retail opportunities, says A.T. Kearney, which bases its Global Retail Development Index (GRDI) score on a mix of market attractiveness, country risk, market saturation, and time pressure (how fast retail is growing).
China (GRDI of 65.3) scored particularly well in “time pressure” (96.6 on a 100-point scale), enough to edge it past Uruguay (65.1) for the top spot.
Rounding out the top 5 this year are Chile (62.3), Qatar (59.1) and Mongolia (58.8), with the latter scoring highly for market saturation and time pressure.