Singapore, resilient so far to the turmoil that has swept emerging markets, appears to be one of the most financially vulnerable countries in Asia, Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BofAML) said in a note on Monday.
Singapore, India and Malaysia have the poorest scores among major Asian markets excluding Japan, based on 10 factors used to measure financial vulnerability, the report said. Those factors include excessive real credit growth, the gap between credit and economic growth, the returns on financial stocks and the state of the current account.
According to BofAML, a number of major Asian markets have their financial vulnerability scores close to levels seen in mid-1997, just before the Asian financial crisis.
"Elevated financial vulnerability is often, but not always associated with currency and/or banking crises. Singapore (surprisingly), India and Malaysia score poorly on our measure," they said.
The report added: "China, Hong Kong and Indonesia are also concerning. Korea and Taiwan look less vulnerable, while Thailand is in the middle."
Huge current account deficits and a lack of confidence in policy makers' ability to deliver structural reforms have put India and Indonesia at the heart of the sell-off in Asian emerging-market assets.
(Read more: Spotlight falls on India's new central bank chief)
And amid nagging worries about a possible unwinding of U.S. monetary stimulus, the trigger for the rout in emerging markets that began in May, focus has also turned to which emerging-market countries should weather the storm and which might be the next to bear the brunt of selling.