While speculating on the future direction of interest rates, currencies, and monetary policy can generate great headlines, it often raises the question; ‘what does this mean for investors?’ Understanding the implications of the macro environment drives asset allocation decisions, which according to research by Robert Ibbotson and Paul Kaplan, accounts... Show More
WiseTech, Appen, Afterpay, Altium and Xero (WAAAX) are up just over five-fold over the last two years, pushing the aggregate market cap to over $28 billion. Some of the valuation metrics are now laughable. However... the same thing was also true two years ago before this rally commenced. So where... Show More
For more than a year now, fears of a housing-led recession have been building in Australia. First, auction clearances fell in a hole, then house price declines, falling credit growth and building approvals, and finally, unemployment began to rise. A month ago, further falls seemed inevitable. Then Australian woke up... Show More
Investing in “blue chips” – large, highly profitable, and mature companies – has long been a popular strategy for investors. But contrary to its popularity, research has shown (i) that the largest stocks consistently underperform over the long-term. Perhaps investors have fallen victim to survivorship bias? Rather than looking at... Show More
What will the world look like in five years’ time? A difficult question to answer, but one that long-term equity investors must ask themselves every day. In 2014, Amazon remained outside the world’s top 10 companies, Telstra’s share price peaked at over $6.60 per share, and Afterpay was nothing more... 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
Growth stocks like Afterpay, Appen and Nearmap that are making waves offshore have been dominating the leader board. Meanwhile, domestic cyclicals have been struggling as deteriorating economic conditions weigh them down. How are investors supposed to invest in this dichotomy, in which growth stocks with overseas success look ever more... Show More
February offers insights on companies and economies around the world, including the US and China, which are of particular interest this time around. This years’ reporting offered the first real insight as to the impact of the US-China trade war on the largest companies and economies in the world. In... Show More
A good chart distils terabytes of data into a small image that delivers a big message. And to cherry-pick the messages investors need to hear most right now, we asked some of Australia’s top managers to nominate one chart above all others. Mik Case from Schroders and Chris Rands at... Show More
Few things strike more fear into the hearts of investors than waking up to an unexpected “Market Update and Outlook” on a key holding in the portfolio. While it sometimes brings good news, more often than not, a big fall in share price follows. Situations like this can create panic,... Show More