“We think the dollar hit a cyclical peak and that we’ll be trading in a band of volatility that is slowly moving downward in terms of the dollar becoming less valuable,” says Ristuben. “That headwind will become much more friendly to emerging markets for the foreseeable future.”

Emerging market equities and debt also have valuations more attractive than U.S. and developed equities, notes Russell Investments.

Both Russell and Carter note the rise of the global consumer, especially within emerging markets. For Carter,  the rise of the emerging markets internet consumer is “the greatest growth story” of his lifetime.

“The revenue growth of some of the companies in our index has been close to 40 percent a year,” says Carter. “We launched three years ago, and some of these companies are twice as big as they were when we launched.”

In a recent paper, Russell wrote that not all emerging markets are created equal. While equity markets in Poland, Turkey, Greece and Korea all returned more than 25 percent through the first half of 2017, markets in Pakistan, Qatar and Russia posted negative returns over the same time period.

China’s markets returned roughly 25 percent through the first half of 2017. Moving forward, it appears that Chinese growth has resumed and will continue, says Carter.

“The ‘crash’ of China was a myth,” says Carter. “I was in China two weeks after the so-called flash crash and it was still booming. The serious, long-term problems that people were predicting out of China have never materialized. They have a lot of money, their debt and deficit levels are low, and they have a closed system. They can deal with almost any problem easier than we can.”

Russell is currently overweight emerging markets, says Ristuben, and despite the recent 12-month rally, believes that their growth is far from over.

“There’s a strategic argument to be made for the inclusion of emerging markets within a total portfolio, and it boils down to higher returns,” says Ristuben. “Most investors have to seek a higher rate of return than they’re going to get from just U.S. equities and an income portfolio.”

Many market analysts, including Research Affiliates, have predicted that over the next decade U.S. markets will deliver annualized returns of 1 percent or less.