Investing

[ad_1] Shocks, Crises, and False Alarms: How to Assess True Macroeconomic Risk. 2024. Philipp Carlsson-Szlezak and Paul Swartz. Harvard Business Review Press. Good macroeconomic predictions and risk assessments are not easy to make, so maybe the problem should be reframed not as an effort in prediction but as a process […]

[ad_1] The environmental, social, and governance (ESG) fund industry reached a crossroads on 26 August 2021. That day, investigations by the SEC and the German regulator BaFin into allegations that Deutsche Bank’s DWS had overstated the claimed ESG integration of a portion of its funds were reported in the press. […]

[ad_1] “Oversimplify: to simplify to such an extent as to bring about distortion, misunderstanding, or error.” Some very black-and-white and reductive opinions about the prudence of active management have been making the rounds in the investment world of late. For example, in Defined Contribution Plans: Challenges and Opportunities for Plan […]

[ad_1] The credit markets have developed a highly concentrated buy-side structure since the global financial crisis (GFC). Driven largely by regulators, this has limited financial institutions’ ability to provide market liquidity at a critical time. As low interest rates and central bank bond buying have inflated corporate bond issuance, liquidity-providing […]

[ad_1] A new investment style has proliferated over the last decade or so: the copycat investor. The basic idea is always the same. Look at the quarterly reports of prominent investment gurus and their holdings at the end of each quarter. Then simply invest in the same stocks they hold. […]

[ad_1] Beyond Diversification: What Every Investor Needs to Know about Asset Allocation. 2020. Sébastien Page, CFA. McGraw Hill. Sébastien Page, CFA, explains the pros and cons of different approaches to forecasting returns, risks, and correlations across asset classes. He explores methods of constructing portfolios to meet a range of client […]

[ad_1] Younger generations in the United States and other developed nations increasingly worry about economic trends that threaten to jeopardize their financial futures. The United States struggles with rising national debt, sparking fears that the dollar might lose its dominant status as the world’s reserve currency. This issue is further […]

[ad_1] The US stock market has never before been this top heavy, and no easy solution, or indeed any solution, appears to be within the grasp of investors. The peak of the dot.com bubble seems quaint by comparison to the present market structure, with the top 10 weight currently standing […]

[ad_1] Discussions of the relative merits of passive vs. active investing are ubiquitous these days and — so long as discussions thoughtfully add to the debate — we at the Investment Company Institute (ICI) rarely feel compelled to offer a critical response. But some publications force us to speak up. […]

[ad_1] Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) considerations are not always as black and white as many anticipate. Take, for example, the recent trend of large extractive companies selling off carbon-intensive assets, partially in an effort to “decarbonize” their portfolios. Such actions may look like progress towards addressing investor concerns about […]