Best Blogs of the Week

Best Blogs of the Week #253

Posted by Anu Heda on Dec 12, 2016, in Best Blogs of the Week , tagged with ,

Posts related to DOL rule changes are starting to appear regularly. I thought to highlight the best post on the topic to-date, via Russell Investments.

Russell – The DOL Rule: Tension at the heart of the fiduciary standard – And if fiduciaries focus on following prescriptive rules, then their decisions can only be as good as the rules themselves, rules that are reactive in nature, constantly trailing changing circumstances, and potentially even acting as a barrier to the evolution of best practices.

DOL via Russell

 

Best Blogs of the Week #252

Posted by Anu Heda on Dec 05, 2016, in Best Blogs of the Week , tagged with

Nearly a month after the election, the industry continues evaluating potential changes forthcoming from the President-Elect (Trumpflation) amongst over traditional blog topics.

AB – Trumpflation Risk: What You Need to Know – For anyone who is either investing or evaluating investment managers, the information ratio is a powerful key to successfully understanding manager performance. It’s powerful because it gets to the heart of measuring an investment manager’s skill.

Inflation Chart (Trumpflation)

Wells Fargo – What the information ratio tells bond investors – For anyone who is either investing or evaluating investment managers, the information ratio is a powerful key to successfully understanding manager performance. It’s powerful because it gets to the heart of measuring an investment manager’s skill.

info ration

Reflation

Best Blogs of the Week #251

Posted by Anu Heda on Nov 21, 2016, in Best Blogs of the Week , tagged with , ,

Favorite post of the week covers reflation (Act of stimulating the economy by increasing the money supply or by reducing taxes, seeking to bring the economy back up to the long-term trend, following a dip in the business cycle. It is the opposite of disinflation, which seeks to return the economy back down to the long-term trend.) . Less than two weeks since the election and most industry blog posts continue to describe potential changes and situations across regions and asset classes. I tend to like posts with a clear viewpoint on 1 – 2 issues.

BlackRock – Welcome to the new world of reflation – Besides the impact of aggressive fiscal stimulus that President-elect Trump has proposed, inflation expectations are rising on the back of fundamental developments that preceded the election.

BlackRock – What a Trump presidency could mean for bond markets long term – We see a potential headwind for municipal bonds.

Franklin Templeton – A Fresh Look at DOL and Retirement Issues Under Trump – Trump has a very limited, if any, agenda on retirement issues that we can determine. His advisors have been quoted as calling for the repeal of the DOL fiduciary rule, but his populist rhetoric has been largely adversarial toward Wall Street.

Wells Fargo – The investment landscape after the election – After a brief hiccup, I think the market has it right: Trump will be pro-growth. This should be good for stocks and not good for high-quality bonds.

 

Best Blogs of the Week #250

Posted by Anu Heda on Nov 14, 2016, in Best Blogs of the Week , tagged with , , ,

POTUS 45. There’s not much for me to say that hasn’t been written all over the Internet. From reading 50+ blog posts related to the election, I can affirm asset managers tread lightly with opinion. Asset managers are more comfortable with sharing the news. With that in mind, four excellent posts.POTUS

Loomis Sayles – A Trump White House: Potential Market Impacts of the US Election – Trump’s proposals are structurally inflationary, but which measures will get passed and implemented is a large unknown.

M&G – President-elect Trump. 5 predictions on what happens next in the global economy and markets – Trump may not build a wall. But even if he does, it won’t keep the robots out.

Putnam – What we might expect with a Trump administration agenda – Trump does not have any specific plans to change Social Security or Medicare. He opposes any increase in the retirement age and would oppose raising the wage base for the Social Security payroll tax.

Russell – U.S. elections 2016: Trump wins White House. Markets react. – So we don’t see this election as having a lasting impact on markets.

Best Blogs of the Week #249

Posted by Anu Heda on Nov 07, 2016, in Best Blogs of the Week , tagged with , ,

Power. A President’s power on the global markets. As we’re one day from selecting (please let there not be a tie) the 45th POTUS, it’s a topic that is on many American minds. The Loomis Sayles post shares market impacts directly tied to Presidential power.

BlackRock – Are International Markets Back? – Very slowly, almost stealthily, international equity markets are clawing back relative to the United States. On a dollar-adjusted basis Japanese stock returns are now on par with the United States, with both the S&P 500 and the Nikkei 225 up around 4.5% year-to-date.

President and price to earnings since 1954

Loomis Sayles – Presidential Power: Are We At Risk for a Trade War? – The president has enormous powers to tear up trade agreements and, in many cases, to impose tariff penalties to advance US interests as interpreted by the president.

SSgA – It’s About Time: Using ‘Satisficing’ to Help Clients Make Better, More Efficient Decisions – For all investors, “satisficing” can be the foundation of a more structured process around investment decisions. Satisficing—which combines satisfying and sufficing, and was coined by behavioral economist Herbert Simon—is a way to manage uncertainties in the decision-making process, to stay focused on goals and to avoid being overwhelmed by unlimited information.