Since that fateful day when Britons voted for Brexit a year ago, the British Pound (GBP) has fallen by 11.8% against US Dollars. Worries about Singaporean companies' investments in UK were raised in the aftermath of the vote. However, the fall in GBP was small fry to one Singaporean company which faced much larger currency depreciation in the countries it invested in. The company is Food Empire, which derived 58% of its revenue from Russia and 13% from Ukraine in 2013.
In Mar 2014, Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine. International sanctions on Russia followed suit. Both the Russian Ruble (RUB) and Ukraine Hryvnia (UAH) fell against major currencies. Fig. 1 below shows the fall in RUB (blue line), UAH (red line) and GBP (orange line) against USD since Mar 2014. At the lowest point in Feb 2016, RUB fell by 60% while UAH fell by 70% against USD. ......