The first half of 2022 has so far seen the largest ever destruction of financial wealth in history, both in US$ terms and as a % of GDP (source: BCA Research), and that is before one considers the additional losses that one could have had if exposed to more esoteric investments such as crypto currencies. …

In some ways 2020 was simply a continuation, and huge exacerbation, of existing trends and distortions.  Historically low (and for longer) interest rates, central banks de facto funding budget deficits, and previously winning sectors and stocks now doing even better.  The pandemic was certainly not bad news, business-wise, for Amazon, while for bricks and mortar…

Bide “n” Time?   We do not invest in a vacuum, there is always a context, and with it a direction of travel.  As our clients know, we tend to view this context through the prism of socioeconomics and the ebb and flow of the political scene. For a couple of decades our opinion has…

We are currently living and investing through the most uncertain and strangest of times. The hugely-experienced and well-regarded Jim Stack at InvesTech Research in the US, states that “the past couple months are unlike anything we’ve seen in our historical experience… or archival data”. Simply put, there has never been a time in modern history…

Investors are still struggling to come to terms with an extraordinary collapse in economic activity, its unprecedented speed, and the fact that we are likely to be teasing out multi-order consequences, and unintended ones, from the various policy responses, for years to come. Economic data is already the worst since the Great Depression of the…

Markets are not as volatile as they were last month (March), but then that was the most volatile month in stock market history. Furthermore, last week was the best week for the US equity market since 1974, so, extraordinary movements are still with us, and as befits the lack of clarity around the COVID-19 virus…

This week kicked off with the market weathering its largest sell-off so far, from retail investors, after the worst ever 5-week run for global equity markets. However, during this period there had already been some mild signs of internal stabilisation within the financial markets and with equities registering significantly oversold positions.  Subsequently we have just…

Since our note last week, the news on the progress of Covid-19 has unfortunately got worse.  The policy response however is finally improving, and quite rapidly (though not yet rapidly enough), and with resulting measures that are positive from a public health perspective, but negative in terms of economic outcomes.  Hopefully this can be contained…

There has been what can only be described as pandemonium in financial markets this week, the fastest ever bear market (20% decline), from all-time highs, and the worst individual day for equity markets since October 19th, 1987.  This has been predicated on the progress and spread of the Coronavirus, the unfortunately timed oil-price war (Saudi…

En passant – debt, risks, and unintended consequences We will circulate a shorter-term piece on markets, valuations and opportunities, early in 2020. Here, however, we look to assess structural risks, the morphing of one debt problem to another, and the reality of unintended consequences. We will also touch upon the changing political landscape (extremism and…