Although American based tech giants – such as Google, Facebook and Amazon – are already household names, it may surprise some investors to know that Asia has technologically leapfrogged the U.S. in several respects and has many successful tech megastars of its own.  As this note will demonstrate, these Asian tech tigers – exposure to

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Australian investors have likely recently felt the effects of market volatility, which has put downward pressure on many large cap Australian companies that offer relatively high yields. For investors with a concentrated single stock portfolio, this recent performance trend highlights the danger of relying on a small number of high yield stocks for retirement portfolios.

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Thanks to rapid technological advances, the global robotics and artificial intelligence (A.I.) sectors stand poised to significantly boost global economic productivity and redress worker shortages caused by population ageing over coming decades.  As this note will demonstrate, moreover, the robot revolution also offers the growth potential to reward investors who tap into this emerging global

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One of the most common questions I get asked on ETFs relates to liquidity, largely driven by the common misconception that ETFs are somehow illiquid due to the fact that ‘on-screen’ liquidity at times appears limited (particularly compared to popular shares). Even though we have dealt with this area a number of times in other

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Industry Breaks the $40B Barrier The Australian ETF industry grew very strongly in August reaching a new record high of $41.5B. The industry grew a rapid 3.7% in the month ($1.5B), 2/3 of which was driven by asset appreciation particularly in the U.S. sharemarket. Read on for details of the month in ETFs.

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With the US labour market tight and inflation starting to lift, one similar historical episode that has attracted investor attention, and which may be instructive for today’s market, relates to the late 1960s.  At that time US wage and price inflation started to lift quite quickly, which eventually led to higher interest rates and a

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Global equities pushed higher last month reflecting steady bond yields, reasonable valuations and – most importantly – continued strength in earnings.  Technology remains flavour of the month, whereas gold exposures are least favoured. Market Trends – September 2018 Update  

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The last few years have certainly been fruitful for some investors in the international space, with most markets showing meaningful gains. The future, however, may hold more uncertainty, with quantitative tightening and heightened geopolitical risks anticipated as we look ahead. In years gone by the response to failing markets and economies was that of fiscal

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With solid global demand and ongoing supply side disruptions, oil prices could well remain reasonably firm over the coming year. If so, there may be investment opportunities in energy related ETFs. In this post, I examine the dynamics of oil and investment opportunities further. Oil Market Appears Tight Since bottoming in early 2016, global oil

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After nearly a decade of incredibly easy monetary policy, the global interest rate cycle is turning. The US Federal Reserve has started to increase official interest rates and unwind quantitative easing and in Australia, although official interest rates are on hold, the next move is more likely to be up rather than down. So where

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