The ASX 200 clawed back +4 points today after dropping 69 yesterday although it was hardly inspiring considering US Futures were trading up +0.35% during our time zone while Asian markets overall recovered from yesterday’s declines – the Japanese Nikkei the best in the region up +2.50% after losing ~3%... Show More
Billed as the "property punch-up of the century" by News.com.au, and as "Fight Night" by Sky Business TV, I went head-to-head for 30 heated minutes with mega perma-bear John Adams last night on Peter Switzer's television show. I thought I smashed Adams pretty convincingly, and Switzer appeared to agree in... Show More
Comparison website iSelect’s (ISU) half year results last month showed revenue falling 12% on the previous December half. For most companies lower revenue would mean sharply lower profits. Not for iSelect. Profit was up 79%. Why the disparity? Show More
Around the world, car sales are declining. From the United States to China, car lots are suffering from increasing unsold inventory. In China, for example, automobile sales fell 13.9% in November from a year earlier, the steepest such drop in more than six years, and for 2018, car sales recorded... Show More
We take our monthly look at the returns of Australian Microcap Funds. The majority of microcap funds continued their good start to 2019 and the majority of managers appear to have had a decent reporting season on an overall portfolio level at least. Show More
Hostelworld was created to provide an affordable online global distribution channel for hostels and budget accommodation providers. The company is designed for a customer base that is not well served by the broader online travel agency (OTA) universe. Frequent customers of hostels, known as “hostellers’”, generally enjoy the affordability, environmental... Show More
Carvana offers a fully integrated way to buy a second hand car online or via an app. The cars are delivered shortly after using Carvana-owned logistics. You can also pick up a car from one of 15 vending machines in highly visible locations and not even have to speak to... Show More
Let’s start by reviewing what the yield curve actually is. Consider a range of durations for government notes, for example, you can have 3-month notes, 1-year notes, 2-year notes and so on up to 30-year bonds and notes. Show More
The market pulled back sharply today booking its worst performance since the first trading day of the calendar year following the weak lead from overseas on Friday night, growth concerns in a number of regions coming back into focus and overshadowing expectations of lower interest rates for longer. Talk around... Show More
Using shares to generate income is not getting any easier. Thankfully there are other options. In this short video interview, Michael Korber, Head of Credit and Fixed Income at Perpetual Investments explains the importance of optimising the defensive part of your portfolio. Show More
After fears of rising interest rates and bond market volatility rocked global financial markets last year, the consensus is now swinging back to the low economic growth / low interest rates narrative. We’ve gone from headlines like this last year; Show More
It finally happened. After a few months of hovering over the policy pause button, the Federal Reserve officially halted interest rate hikes. For the first time in 10 quarters, no measure to further tighten monetary policy was announced. Show More
Nufarm (ASX: NUF) is an undervalued agricultural crop protection company that has strong global exposure with 97% of earnings originating from outside Australia. We invested in NUF as we believed the market was incorrectly assuming that poor drought conditions in Australia and Europe would continue indefinitely. Furthermore, the share price... Show More
In ancient times early cartographers would illustrate mythological sea monsters into the edges of their maps. The fantastical images of serpents and basilisks represented dangerous areas where ships had been lost, and unexplored territories through which mariners feared to sail. Says Thomas Sander of the Washington Map Society, “It was... Show More
The market took its bullish que from the US overnight with stocks having a belated response to the Feds dovish commentary on Thursday – the Dow put on +216 points feeding into a bullish open in Australia and the market went on with – up until lunchtime at least. On... Show More
In the last 117 years, Australia has seen two World Wars, the Great Depression, the introduction of the motor car, 30 Prime Ministers, and every year, Washington H Soul Pattinson (SOL) has paid a dividend. In this week's episode of The Rules of Investing, I sit down with Robert Millner,... Show More
Short-term reactionary behaviour is to be expected within every earnings season, and February 2019 was no exception. But opportunities that went misinterpreted or unappreciated by the herd await patient investors willing to block out the noise and really take a look at a company’s fundamentals and growth prospects. Here, we... Show More
Today I argue that the smartest thing RBA governor Phil Lowe could do is get the banks to cut rates for him---preserving his monetary policy ammunition for a real crisis---and show that substantial reductions in bank funding costs might enable our largest lenders to do precisely that. I also reveal... Show More
Making sensible investment decisions is difficult. We are subject to a range of behavioural biases. We have to cope with incessant noise around financial markets. We behave in ways that are inconsistent with our long-term investment objectives. So what can we do about it? Show More
An innovative car company at the vanguard of autonomous driving, with a vision defined as ‘zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion’ must be a Silicon Valley darling with “funding secured (1)”. However, to the surprise of many, it is the 110 year old, General Motors. Quietly in the background,... Show More
