Tag: asset class

June was a brutal month for global equities, capping the worst first half of a year since the launch of the MSCI All Country World Index in 1987. For indices with longer track records, the story is worse. In the case of the US S&P500, the first half performance has not been this bad since 1962.

Equity markets have been under considerable selling pressure in 2022, as investors anticipate that stubbornly high inflation will cause central banks to raise short-term interest rates multiple times this year. At the same time, expectations for global economic growth have been revised downwards, following further disruptions to global supply chains on the back of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and China’s strict COVID-19 lockdown measures.

In a recent conference, National Treasury Acting DG Ismail Momoniat explained National Treasury’s views on the two-pot retirement system, governance of umbrella funds and changes to Regulation 28. Ismail Momoniat, Acting Director-General at National Treasury (NT), addressed the recent Pension Lawyers Association Virtual Conference in May 2022 with an update on retirement reform developments.

A record sell-off coupled with a shifting economic backdrop mean opportunities in global fixed income markets have appeared. It has been an extraordinary time for bond markets. As an asset class, fixed income is often seen as equities’ boring cousin, particularly over the past decade of low yields. Recent months, however, have been anything but boring, albeit for the wrong reasons.

The future of fleet management in South Africa is supporting the need to reduce future fleet costs through direct cost savings or increased efficiencies and utilization gains. This is not simply restricted to fleet management but will be achieved in conjunction with technology advancements in service delivery and supply chain management activities.

Diversification within the asset management industry can be applied on different levels and can take many forms within an investment solution. With close to R3 trillion invested in collective investment schemes in South Africa, investors are already taking advantage of the diversification benefit on offer by unit trusts.

A few weeks into 2022, an underlying investment theme started to emerge, that of a continued, broad-based recovery with strong economic performance across the globe. Evidence of this recovery was noted in the U.S. Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) January 2022 statement.

Markets continued their rally into the fourth quarter of 2021, with South African (SA) equities delivering its strongest calendar year return since 2012 (up 27.1%) and global equities since 2015 (up 28.8% in Rands).

Today is Heritage Day, and for many South Africans, this is an appropriate time to reflect on the assets that they’ve built up over years, and possibly generations. In these uncertain times, it’s important to re-evaluate the value of your assets, and to determine how best to leave a legacy.

‘When one door closes, another one opens,’ as the saying goes, and this is particularly true when it comes to investments. Economic recovery is on the horizon, and while it is expected and somewhat priced in by present market activity, investors are more interested in looking at what lies ahead. And here there may be some opportunities.