South Africa's rand hit a fresh five year low on Monday as the currency came under sustained pressure amid a worldwide flight from emerging markets.

The South African unit, often seen as a bellwether for emerging market currencies, has been under pressure since the US Federal Reserve announced that it would trim back stimulus spending.

"The rand has now fallen by 25 percent against the dollar since last May," said Shilan Shah of Capital Economics.

South Africa has been dubbed one of the "Fragile Five" emerging economies which are struggling under a large current account deficit.

"There is clearly a danger that the rand falls much further over the coming months," said Shah.

The precipitous fall of the currency possess another headache for the South African Reserve Bank, which meets later this week.

Magnit, Russia’s largest food retailer, is off to the worst start to a year since its 2008 listing in London while TCS has slid since a Nov. 15 report that Russia’s proposed ban on the sale of credit cards by mail would hurt its business. Analysts surveyed by Bloomberg predict record revenue for both companies even as Russia’s economy grows at the slowest pace since a 2009 recession.

Tinkov said he’s seen “a lot of stupidity, lack of logic and irrational behavior” since TCS was listed in London, according to comments posted on his Facebook account.

Investors in funds based in the United States pulled $2.6 billion from emerging markets stock funds in the week ended January 29, marking their biggest net outflow since February 2011, data from Thomson Reuters' Lipper service showed on Thursday.

The turmoil in emerging markets also triggered outflows from U.S.-based emerging market bond funds of $606 million in the latest week, for the third consecutive week, Lipper added.

Investors in exchange-traded funds are thought to represent the institutional investor, including hedge funds.

Tjornehoj noted that it was the ETF investors who yanked the majority of their money from emerging markets equities, though "retail investors have been committing less to the sector. The headline risk is dominating the asset class."