Americans, bored in their COVID-induced ‘bubbles,’ turned to board games for fun last year, boosting sales 300%. They rolled the dice, drew the cards, and buffed the skills of cooperation, problem solving, emotional intelligence, and reflective logic — the same competencies critical to successful investment strategies. So, we couldn’t help looking back nostalgically to our favourite games — and probably yours — as we look forward to crafting a sustainable investment game plan.
The fifth month of 2021 will not go down as an important month for global investors. Most equity and bond market investors made some positive – but relatively modest – gains during May. And whilst COVID-19 vaccination progress across many countries has been notable over recent weeks, the general economic outlook across the U.K., United States and Europe has recently improved. Certainly underlying confidence for the rest of this year and into 2022 has improved over recent weeks.
Goldilocks or Little Red Riding Hood?
On Wednesday we had a monthly reading of US Core CPI (core consumer inflation) which has got the market asking the above question. The reading was +0.9% which is a huge jump month on month, the highest for 39 years and well above expectations.Continue reading
April was another interesting month, with gains across almost all global stock markets led by the United States, but closely followed by the U.K. and Europe. Whilst the former two were significantly aided by continued COVID-19 vaccine progress and associated national reopening, Europe has started to make some progress too.
Sixty years ago, Marshall Nirenberg and Henrich Matthaei began the process of cracking the genetic code. Thanks to their persistence and resilience, today’s scientists developed effective mRNA-based vaccines in record time – saving millions of lives from COVID-19. With the darkest days of the pandemic behind us, investors can also appreciate the resilience of the economy and financial markets and the hopeful prospect of brighter days ahead.
Suez Canal, Major Football Transfers and the Oil Market
When I first saw the images of the recent Suez Canal incident, I thought it was photoshopped. To put the size of the ship into context, it is longer than the Eiffel Tower and weights 220,000 tons. The salvage teams shovelled 30,000 cubic meters of sand to free the ship, which has now cleared the canal for business as usual.Continue reading
Calling all Business Owners – Pension Planning
The Chancellor’s Budget has been designed to guide us out of the Covid crisis.
It’s no secret that we will all end up paying for the Covid relief spendingContinue reading
Financial Fitness Test
Do you have a strong financial why and a measurable deadline?
Whatever your motivation, you have until the 5th April to make use of available personal tax allowances. Continue reading
It is less than a year since Rishi Sunak presented his first Budget, after having been in the role of Chancellor for less than a month. His despatch box première featured an allocation of £12bn towards mitigating the impact of the Covid-19. Ironically, on the same day as Mr Sunak revealed that boost to spending, the World Health Organisation declared the outbreak a pandemic. Total expenditure in the U.K. on dealing with the pandemic is now estimated to be around £300bn.
The valuation of everything
Page 1 of the investing textbook states one should only take risk when one is being rewarded for doing so. This means that the valuation of everything is based off the expected return of the lowest risk asset. It is widely accepted that the lowest risk investment asset available is long dated government bonds. The proxy for this is the 10 year UK government bond in the UK and the 10 year treasury in the USA.Continue reading