Archives for January 2016

The top six trends driving the outlook for the newly formed investment consulting and insurance giant Willis Towers Watson are combining to provide a generally “mediocre” outlook for markets over the medium term. In its January global markets paper the firm’s asset research team explains the three-five-year asset class weightings. In the major asset classes:… [Read More…]

US-based global manager Ranger International Management has drawn a comparison between the so-called FANG stocks in the US market and the Nifty 50 of the late1960s and early 1970s. The comparison could help investors get a better perspective on current market sentiment. The FANGs – Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Alphabet (Google) – were the darlings… [Read More…]

December inflows of US$52 billion tipped the global exchange-traded product (ETP) market into record territory last year with investors increasingly adopting more diversified and opportunistic strategies, the latest BlackRock on the sector shows. According to the December 2015 BlackRock ‘Global ETP Landscape’ report, annual flows hit more than US$350 billion over the calendar year –… [Read More…]

Jason Hsu, a co-founder of California-based Research Affiliates, creator of the ‘fundamental index’ and promoter of smart beta, has bought a majority interest in the firm’s Asian business, which has been reformed into a new company known as Rayliant Global Advisors. Hsu will remain the vice chairman and a shareholder of Research Affiliates, which will… [Read More…]

Investment schemes structured as unlisted equities would be subject to tougher compliance standards under proposals floated by the Financial Markets Authority (FMA) last month. The FMA plan – released in a Financial Markets Conduct Act (FMC) regulatory consultation paper dump in December – would see a number of investment schemes, currently classified as equities, corralled… [Read More…]

  Fisher Funds has dumped Public Trust as trustee from a range of funds inherited as part of its 2013 purchase of Tower Investments. In a December 2015 prospectus for the four funds, marketed collectively as the Fisher Funds Investment Series Unit Trusts, the manager named its back-office provider of choice, Trustee Executors (TE), as… [Read More…]

Sovereign Wealth Funds invest in a contrarian manner compared with fund managers and super funds, according to new research from State Street Global Advisors. They take bigger bets on growth assets and use their size and longer-term liabilities time horizon to best advantage. Everyday investors can learn from them. The research paper, written by Elliot… [Read More…]

Andrew Mehrtens, a former senior sales executive at Centric Wealth, a subsidiary of the accounting and planning group Findex, starts a new finance career in securities servicing this year. He joined NAB Asset Servicing, based in Sydney, last month. Mehrtens, 42, best known for his sporting prowess as a 70-cap rugby international with the New… [Read More…]

The year ahead promises only “limited upside potential for investment returns”, according to the Russell Investments ‘2016 Annual Global Outlook’. In the report, published just before the China-inspired global equity market plunge that greeted January, Russell says the 2015 scenario of “stretched equity valuations, low bond yields and narrow credit spreads” would intensify this year…. [Read More…]

Towers Watson, a keen promoter of smart-beta strategies for its big fiduciary clients, has come up with a term for us to categorise the old-style beta: “bulk beta”. More importantly, the consulting firm has produced a paper describing the implications of smart-beta trends for what we used to know as “alpha”. The paper, ‘Into a… [Read More…]