If I told you that your best chance of finding an investment fund that is going to outperform in the future would be to screen for the worst performing funds in the past, you might think I was crazy. But one of the things we like to see when we’re... Show More
January this year brought the sad news that Jack Bogle had died. Mr Bogle, the founder of the Vanguard Group, was the great pioneer of passive investing. Since he began to promote index-tracking funds in the 1970s, there’s been a huge increase in their use. This increase accelerated with the... Show More
We take our monthly look at the returns of Australian Microcap Funds. The majority of funds endured double-digit and drawdowns in the Dec 18 quarter. This large drawdown in the last quarter also pulled the majority of the funds negative for the calendar year. Show More
We take our monthly look at the returns of Australian Microcap Funds. While most funds avoided the large drawdowns seen in October the majority still posted small negative absolute returns for November. We can only hope for a late Santa Clause rally to put some gloss on what looks to... Show More
Well, October 18 was a brutal month for microcaps with the S&P/ASX Emerging Companies Index closing down 10.9% for the month, Yikes! Although things have stabilised in November there has been no major recovery of the losses in October. Not that the larger cousins escaped without injury, the S&P/ASX All... Show More
The debate on active versus passive has gone on for years, with many investors loyal to one camp of the other. But… Why not use both? Christian Obrist, Head of iShares in Australia echoed these sentiments when we asked about the biggest trends in ETFs today. Show More
Q1FY19 was a challenging quarter for microcap managers but the majority of managers navigated the market well with the average manager posting a return of +2.6% for the quarter. This was in contrast to S&P/ASX All Ordinaries Accumulation Index which returned +1.9% for the period. The performance of large stocks... Show More
Most broad-based equity indices around the world predominately comprise mature, old-world industrial businesses, highly geared companies including banks, low quality commodity-based businesses, capital intensive businesses and speculative stocks. For many of these companies the long-term return on capital and organic revenue growth outlook is modest at best. This low-quality equity... Show More
BuildingIQ (BIQ: ASX) Is a stock that is completely off the wider investment radar for a reason that will become obvious in due course. That doesn’t mean though it’s not an interesting investment proposition. Show More
Well, the first quarter of FY19 is behind us and it has been tough for microcaps. As I alluded to in my newsletter last month, reporting season overall was pretty insipid as far as microcaps were concerned. This is reflected in the performance of the index with the S&P/ASX Emerging... Show More