Obama rocks in Europe and Asia - but not in the US

President Barack Obama has rock-star appeal among the investing class - except in his own country.

The Quarterly Bloomberg Global Poll of financial investors and analysts finds attitudes about the new President in Asia and Europe are overwhelmingly positive. In the US, by contrast, they are slightly negative.

In Europe and Asia, 87 per cent of respondents say they view Obama positively, compared with just 49 per cent in the US.

His standing among American investors is even lower on economic matters: only a quarter of US poll respondents rate his economic policies as "good" or "excellent", compared with more than half in Europe and Asia.

Obama's "stratospheric favourability ratings" outside the US after five months in office are related to attitudes about his predecessor, former President George W. Bush, says J. Ann Selzer, the president of Selzer & Co, a polling firm that conducted the survey.

"It speaks as much to the visceral distaste for George Bush outside of the US," she said.

In Europe and Asia, more than four of five poll respondents choose Obama over Bush as the President offering better economic leadership. In the US, investors pick Bush, 43 per cent to 41 per cent.

Worldwide, Obama has a 73 per cent favourability rating, far higher marks than those of a sampling of other leaders, including UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who has a 34 per cent favourable rating, President Vladimir Putin of Russia, with 23 per cent, and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, with 49 per cent.

Equity investors around the world have done well since Obama's January 20 inauguration. The gains were most pronounced in Asia, where the MSCI Asia Pacific Index has risen 28 per cent. In the US, the S&P 500 Index has risen 19 per cent.

The benchmark index for US equities has rallied 41 per cent over the past four months, led by a 95 per cent rise in financial firms.

European investors, though they are more bullish on Obama than their US counterparts, have fared less well: the Eurostoxx 50 Index has risen 14 per cent.

The poll of investors and analysts on six continents was conducted on July 14-17. It's based on interviews with a random sample of 1076 Bloomberg subscribers, representing decision makers in markets, finance and economics.

The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

There isn't much difference in favourability ratings for Obama across professions. Among respondents in the fixed-income sector, he gets 70 per cent, and his rating with equity investors is 71 per cent.

A plurality of all investors, 43 per cent, rate Obama's economic policies as good or excellent. Twenty-eight per cent say they are average and the same number say they are below average or poor.

Obama's policies for handling the crises in the financial and auto markets is praised by Italian poll respondent Mario Di Marcantonio, a 32-year-old portfolio manager for Eurizon Capital SGR in Milan.

"Companies like Goldman and Morgan Stanley have been able to survive this crisis and do business as usual, and people working at GM will continue to have their jobs," he says. "I don't think they can solve the problems of the world overnight, but at least they're starting to fix it."

The views of Chris Gurkovic, a 36-year-old strategist for First Brokers Securities in Jersey City, are typical of many US respondents. He says bailouts of the auto and financial industries and Obama's health-care proposals are making Americans like him nervous about the government's role in the economy, and rates the president "very unfavourably" in the survey.

"I feel that we're becoming a socialist nation," Gurkovic says. "It's not a step in the right direction; the big- government policies kind of scare me."

Brown, the UK Prime Minister, gets low grades across the board. This is particularly true in Europe, where only one-quarter of respondents gave him a favourable rating. Putin also gets bad marks from these investors.

- BLOOMBERG