ETF industry continues growth path as global markets fall In a month where global equity markets fell significantly, the ETF industry managed to continue its growth trajectory. Total industry FuM at the month end was $36.9B, with the industry growing ~1% for the month ($339m). Trading value was also very strong, with ETF investors seeking out the

Read more

Although “ethical” investing is clearly on the rise, some investors may be dismayed to find what they thought was an ethically orientated investment fund may still be exposed to industries that many values-based investors would be looking to avoid, such as fossil fuel generation, armaments, gambling, tobacco, junk food and alcohol. In this post I look

Read more

Market Performance Global equities pulled back in February, with the MSCI All-Country Index dropping 3.5%, largely due to concerns over rising inflation and bond yields in the US, following a higher than expected US wage gain reported for January. By region, declines were fairly evenly spread across the US, Europe, Japan and Emerging Markets.  By

Read more

BetaShares launched its NASDAQ-100 ETF (ASX code: NDQ) in May 2015, and since then the fund has been on a steady upwards trajectory. The performance of the fund has been over 27% in the past year to end February 2018, driven by strong earnings growth in the technology, healthcare and consumer sectors that dominate the NASDAQ-100 Index

Read more

From the looks of it, it seems as though 2018 will be a year of synchronised economic growth and gradually rising inflation. These circumstances generally create an enviable environment for certain investment sectors, with a fair bit written recently about the potential upside for industries such as banking & consumer and technology stocks. Amongst the

Read more

Recent market concerns with regard to rising bond yields has once again drawn attention to the value of floating versus fixed rate bonds in such an environment. This note provides an update on the recent performance of these two types of bond exposure. Risk and Return in Fixed vs Floating Bond Exposures  As I’ve previously explained,

Read more

Famed American investor Warren Buffett is known to carefully assess his major stock purchases from a very long-run valuation perspective.  In this light, his recently revealed favourite stock is instructive for what it says about the US tech sector, and the NASDAQ-100 in particular. Buffett – An Apple in his eye In a regulatory filing

Read more

Human capital in asset allocation Most readers and investment professionals will accept that “time in the market” beats “timing the market” as the key to wealth generation over the long run. Despite this, we tend not to think too much about the accumulation process, often making investments on the assumption of a static lump sum

Read more

NEW YEAR, NEW RECORD! In what is typically a very quiet month for Australian markets, the ETF industry still managed to eke out a new record in terms of assets under management in the first month of 2018. Total industry FuM at the month end was $36.6B, a growth rate of 1.6% or monthly growth of

Read more

The drop back in US equity prices over the past two weeks has had reverberations around the world.   At this early stage, it still seems likely this period will prove only a “correction” in the ongoing global equity bull market.  In this post I analyse historical market corrections with the data suggesting that the worst

Read more