What it means
The term borrows from the "Asian Tiger" economies, which grew very quickly in the decades after the Second World War by exporting manufactured goods and investing heavily in education and infrastructure. The "cubs" are the next generation of countries trying to repeat that playbook.
They are younger, larger in population, and usually less wealthy per person than the original tigers. The exact list is informal, so different banks and fund managers draw the line in slightly different places.
The five countries named above are the most common version, although some lists leave one out or add another. When you read a research report, check which countries it means before comparing its numbers with someone else's.
For a business, the appeal is a growing middle class that is buying more phones, cars, financial products and consumer goods. Manufacturers also look at these countries as lower-cost bases for production, especially when they want to spread supply chain risk away from a single country.
Banks and insurers see large numbers of people who are only just entering the formal financial system. The risks are real and well known to anyone who invests in emerging markets.
Currencies can swing sharply, political and regulatory conditions differ widely from country to country, and growth can stall if a country fails to move up from low-cost assembly to higher-value work. A strong decade does not guarantee the next one.
The practical point for non-specialists is that the group is a convenient shorthand, not a single market. Each country has its own currency, legal system, tax rules and business customs.
Treating them as one block leads to poor forecasts and poor pricing decisions. For a finance team, the best way to use the label is as a screening tool.
Start with the group to build a long list, then narrow it with hard data such as growth in household income, the stability of the currency, the ease of repatriating profits (moving earnings back home), and the strength of the local banking system. Spending an afternoon on those four checks usually does more for a decision than reading a dozen headline growth forecasts.
In practice
Real-world examples.
Example
A European furniture retailer wants a second sourcing country beside its main supplier base. Its procurement team shortlists a Tiger Cub country with a growing wood-products sector, then prices the landed cost including freight, tariffs and currency risk before moving any orders.
Example
A software company selling subscription tools notices a rising share of its sign-ups coming from Vietnam and Indonesia. The finance team sets up local payment methods and prices in local currency, because card payments alone miss most of the potential customers.
Example
An asset manager builds a regional equity fund focused on the Tiger Cub countries. The investment committee caps the weight of any single country, because one political shock or currency fall could otherwise damage the whole fund.
Case study
Seen in the real world.
Kestrel Home Appliances is an illustrative, fictional company that sells kitchen goods mainly in Europe and North America. Sales there were flat, so the board asked the finance director to study whether the Tiger Cub economies could provide the next phase of growth.
The team built a simple market-entry plan for three countries rather than the whole group. For each one it estimated the number of households that could afford a mid-priced product, the likely distributor margin, and the cost of holding stock in local warehouses.
The illustrative finding was that the best opportunity was not the biggest country but the one where Kestrel could reach customers through an existing online marketplace with little upfront investment. The board approved a small pilot with strict spending limits, and treated the group label as a starting point for research rather than a conclusion.
Watch out
Common mistakes.
- Treating the Tiger Cub economies as a single market with one currency, one set of rules and one consumer.
- Assuming that fast growth in the past guarantees fast growth in the future, when many fast-growing countries have stalled.
- Using a country list from one report without checking whether it matches the list used in another.
Questions
People also ask.
Which countries are the Tiger Cub economies?
The usual list is Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, although the grouping is informal and varies between sources.
How are they different from the Asian Tigers?
The original tigers (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan) are now high-income economies, while the cubs are generally earlier in their development and have larger populations.
Are they the same as BRICS?
No, BRICS is a different grouping of large emerging economies that is based on different countries and a different set of criteria.
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