Global capital never sits still for long. It found the BRICS in the 2000s, and as those economies matured and stumbled, it began scouting a new set of destinations: Mexico, Indonesia, Nigeria and Turkey — the MINTs.

Are the MINTs the New BRICs?

The BRICS acronym — Brazil, Russia, India and China — was coined by Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill in 2001, and for a decade it was the shorthand every global investor used for growth. The label became something of a self-fulfilling prophecy: as more capital chased the story, the growth rates kept justifying the chase.

That run cooled. Brazil, Russia and India each took hits serious enough to spook the “electronic herd” of global capital, even as China kept delivering despite its own strains. With a friendlier government since taking charge in India, renewed energy in Russia, and Brazil using its World Cup hosting duties as a turnaround story, the original four have started to stabilise — but investors, being investors, had already moved on to hunting for the next name.

That hunt landed on the MINTs. O’Neill floated the term again as a follow-on act, and the appeal is easy to see: these are economies that were long treated as extensions of the BRICS story, still under-saturated, and still capable of outsized returns for capital willing to take the risk.

MINT at a Glance

A Closer Look at Each Country

Zoom in on each MINT economy and a distinct investment case emerges.

• Mexico: Its trump card is geography. Sitting next door to the United States gives it a built-in edge for any company looking to cut labour costs without moving production far from the US consumer market — which is exactly why so many American manufacturers have set up plants there.
• Indonesia: Long overshadowed by richer Southeast Asian neighbours such as Malaysia, Singapore and South Korea, Indonesia has shaken off the legacy of the 1997 Asian financial crisis. It now has reasonably developed capital markets, a business class comfortable with Western norms, and a tourism sector competing directly with Thailand — even as crony capitalism and corruption remain unresolved legacies.
• Nigeria: Africa’s growth story has an unlikely champion in a country once associated only with resource extraction. Nigeria is now a genuine gateway for firms wanting a foothold in Africa, helped by relative political stability and a youthful, aspirational middle class more focused on economic opportunity than unrest.
• Turkey: Positioned literally between Europe and Asia, Turkey offers a large English-speaking workforce and a tourism industry built on centuries of history. Political turbulence is real, but global firms have kept entering the market regardless.

Why Investors are Circling the MINTs

1. Favourable demographics — all four countries have a large share of their population under 30, a built-in labour and consumer base for decades to come.
2. Natural-resource wealth, most visibly in Nigeria, that underpins both export earnings and domestic industry.
3. Geostrategic positioning — Mexico’s border with the US and Turkey’s straddling of two continents both translate directly into trade advantages.
4. Economies that are far from saturated, unlike the more mature BRICS markets, leaving more room for capital-intensive investment.
5. A rising class of entrepreneurs already fluent in Western business practices, letting these markets “hit the ground running” rather than needing a decade of adjustment the way China once did.
6. Functioning democratic institutions and judiciaries across all four, with a track record of honouring contracts — a meaningful comfort factor for foreign investors.

Beyond MINT: Other Names on the Watchlist

MINT isn’t the only acronym investors are testing. Vietnam is a recurring name in Southeast Asia, the various Central Asian “stans” bordering Russia and Europe are drawing early interest, and several African economies beyond Nigeria and Latin American markets beyond Mexico are also in the frame.

The common thread across all of them is simple: capital is “colour blind” and largely indifferent to sentiment. It goes wherever economies are under-saturated and the risk-adjusted return looks attractive — which is precisely the logic that put the MINTs on the map in the first place.

The Challenges Nobody Should Gloss Over

The MINT story is not uniformly rosy, and each country carries its own baggage.

• Mexico is fighting what amounts to a low-grade war between the state and drug cartels, a persistent drag on security and investment sentiment.
• Turkey has been rattled by political scandals and unrest over perceptions that the elite are cornering the gains from growth.
• Nigeria faces stiff competition from Chinese capital, which has already established a significant presence, leaving Western investors playing catch-up.
• Indonesia’s corruption runs deep enough that bribery is reportedly common even within private-sector dealings, not just between officials and business.
• All four have young, socially conscious populations who expect their share of growth — raising the odds of Arab-Spring-style unrest, particularly in Turkey and Nigeria, if the gains are seen as flowing only to elites.

MINT in 2026: Checking the Hype Against the Data

A decade on from the original MINT thesis, the numbers offer a useful reality check. The four economies together produce roughly $5.3 trillion in annual output today, a figure projected to grow to somewhere between $8.3 and $10.1 trillion by 2035 — with Indonesia and Mexico driving most of that expansion and Nigeria carrying by far the widest range of possible outcomes.

Snapshot: Growth and Risk in 2026

Indonesia currently looks like the strongest of the four, benefiting from manufacturing activity shifting toward ASEAN economies. Mexico’s momentum has stalled on the back of US tariff exposure. Nigeria’s inflation picture has improved sharply on paper after a statistical rebasing, though poverty remains stubbornly high, and its longer-term trajectory depends heavily on whether reform momentum survives the political cycle. Turkey’s growth is respectable but unspectacular, with monetary-policy credibility the key swing factor to watch.

Conclusion: Confronting Hype with Reality

Every time global capital has crowned a new grouping of countries as the “next big thing,” there has been a wide gap between the pitch and the practice. The healthiest response is to balance the excitement with a sober look at governance, institutions, and follow-through.

The original BRICS are not finished — they are showing signs of a second wind even after their rough patch. Whether it is the BRICS or the MINTs, the deciding factor for long-term investors will always be the same: which governments can actually get the basics of governance right, rather than which acronym sounds the most exciting.