Global ETF News Older than One Year
A Hobbled Recovery Along Entrenched Fault Lines
October 12, 2021---The global recovery continues amid increasing uncertainty, more complex policy trade-offs.
The global recovery continues but momentum has weakened, hobbled by the pandemic. Fueled by the highly transmissible Delta variant, the recorded global COVID-19 death toll has risen close to 5 million and health risks abound, holding back a full return to normalcy. Pandemic outbreaks in critical links of global supply chains have resulted in longer than expected supply disruptions, feeding inflation in many countries.
Overall, risks to economic prospects have increased and policy trade-offs have become more complex.
Compared to our July forecast, the global growth projection for 2021 has been revised down marginally to 5.9 percent and is unchanged for 2022 at 4.9 percent. However, this modest headline revision masks large downgrades for some countries. The outlook for the low-income developing country group has darkened considerably due to worsening pandemic dynamics. The downgrade also reflects more difficult near-term prospects for the advanced economy group, in part due to supply disruptions. Partially offsetting these changes, projections for some commodity exporters have been upgraded on the back of rising commodity prices. Pandemic-related disruptions to contact-intensive sectors have caused the labor market recovery to significantly lag the output recovery in most countries.
Source: IMF.org
IMF-Asset Purchases and Direct Financing: Guiding Principles for Emerging Markets and Developing Economies during COVID-19 and Beyond
October 11, 2021--Summary:
Many central banks in emerging market and developing economies have used asset purchases to reduce financial stresses during the COVID crisis, and some are doing so to provide macroeconomic stimulus.
Source: IMF
BIS Paper-A taxonomy of sustainable finance taxonomies
October 8, 2021--A taxonomy of sustainable finance taxonomies1
Principles for effective taxonomies and proposed policy actions
Abstract
Sustainable finance taxonomies can play an important role in scaling up sustainable finance and, in turn, in supporting the achievement of high-level goals such as the Paris Accord and the UN sustainable development goals. This paper develops a framework to classify and compare existing taxonomies.
Several weaknesses emerge from this classification and comparison, including the lack of usage of relevant and measurable sustainability performance indicators, a lack of granularity and lack of verification of achieved sustainability benefits. On this basis, the paper proposes key principles for the design of effective taxonomies.
The principles are then employed to develop a simple framework for transition taxonomies. The key policy messages of the analysis are:
(i) Endeavor that taxonomies correspond to specific sustainability objectives;
Source: bis.org
Inflation Scares in an Uncharted Recovery
October 6, 2021-- A key question is what combination of events could cause persistently faster price gains.
The economic recovery has fueled a rapid acceleration in inflation this year for advanced and emerging market economies, driven by firming demand, supply shortages, and rapidly rising commodity prices.
We forecast in our latest World Economic Outlook that higher inflation will likely continue in coming months before returning to pre-pandemic levels by mid-2022, though risks of an acceleration do remain.
The good news for policymakers is that long-term inflation expectations are well anchored, but economists still disagree about how enduring the upward pressure for prices will ultimately be.
Source: IMF
BetaShares Market Trends: October 2021 Key global market trends-higher rates take their toll
October 6, 2021--Global equities suffered a setback in September as a rebound in bond yields dragged down still lofty price-to-earnings valuations. The key market development in the month was a more hawkish than expected Federal Reserve policy meeting, which suggested a tapering in bond purchases would be announced next month and U.S. official rates could rise as early as late next year.
Also unnerving sentiment were financial difficulties with leading Chinese property developer Evergrande, and persistent signs of upward inflation pressures due to lingering supply-chain disruptions.
As evident in the chart set below, despite the pullback in equities, the trend in stocks remains upward. The trend in bond yields, the U.S. dollar and overall commodities also appears upward.
Source: betashares.com.au
CPMI and IOSCO publish guidance, call for comments on stablecoinarrangements
October 6, 2021--CPMI and IOSCO call for comments on new consultation report confirmingthat the Principles for Financial Market Infrastructures (PFMI) apply to systemically important stablecoin arrangements (SAs).
The report proposes additional guidance on how certain aspects of the PFMI apply to the novel features of SAs
CPMI and IOSCO may further examine regulatory, supervisory andoversight issues associated with SAs and coordinate with other standard-setting bodies.
The Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI) and the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) today published for public consultation preliminary guidance that confirms and clarifies that stablecoin arrangements should observe international standards for payment, clearing andsettlement systems. "The payments landscape has undergone rapid transformation in recent years andcontinues to evolve at pace. This is happening at the same time as financial innovation offers the prospect of new payment services and greater competition in payments but also potential risks to the financial system.
Source: IOSCO
IMF Annual Report-Build Forward Better-A recovery is underway, but the economic fallout from the global pandemic could be with us for years to come
October 5, 2021--With the crisis exacerbating prepandemic vulnerabilities, country prospects are diverging. Nearly half of emerging market and developing economies and some middle-income countries are now at risk of falling further behind, undoing much of the progress made toward achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Within countries, inequality is on the rise as well; workers with fewer skills, youth, women, and those informally employed are suffering disproportionate income losses.
Sustaining the recovery will require an ongoing policy push, including to secure and expand access to vaccines and to maintain economic lifelines and targeted policy support, tailored to the stage of the pandemic, the strength of the economic recovery, and countries' structural characteristics. Multilateral cooperation will be vital to ensure all countries have equitable access to vaccines and financially constrained economies have adequate access to international liquidity.
view the 2021 IMF Annual Report-Build Forward Better
Source: IMF
Disappearing water in a warming climate: a story in four visuals
October 4, 2021--Water scarcity is poised to exact an increasingly heavy toll.
The issue will likely be a focus of the upcoming COP26 climate summit.
The World Economic Forum has created visualizations of vanishing water in several locations.
Water scarcity will be the biggest climate-related threat to corporate assets like factories within the next few decades, according to a recent report-but it seems to have barely registered on investors’ radar.
Of course, the human cost of worsening scarcity is already fully apparent; about one out of every four people in world don't have access to safely managed drinking water at home, and in just a few years about two-thirds of the global population could face water shortages.
A lack of water is triggering violent conflict in places like India's Northern Plains, and creating new migrants and refugees who may contribute to further shortages wherever they resettle. Sydney will endure shortfalls within 20 years if the city continues growing at its current rate, according to a recent estimate, while residents of San Jose, California, (the "Capital of Silicon Valley") are being threatened with penalties if they don't cut their water use by 15%. Kenya’s drought has been declared a national disaster.
Source: weforum.org
How Investment Funds Can Drive the Green Transition
October 4, 2021---Sustainable investment funds need to be scaled up to support a successful transition to a green economy
The transition to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions requires unprecedented change by companies and governments, as well as additional investment of as much as $20 trillion over the next two decades. Strong fiscal policies, complemented by a broad range of regulatory and financial policies, will be necessary to facilitate the green transition.
The world's $50 trillion investment fund industry, especially funds with a sustainability focus, can play an important role financing the transition to a greener economy and helping to avoid some of the most perilous effects of climate change, according to our recent analysis as part of the IMF's Global Financial Stability Report.
Source: IMF
Crypto Boom Poses New Challenges to Financial Stability
October 1, 2021--As crypto assets take hold, regulators need to step up.
Crypto assets offer a new world of opportunities: Quick and easy payments. Innovative financial services. Inclusive access to previously "unbanked" parts of the world. All are made possible by the crypto ecosystem.
But along with the opportunities come challenges and risks. The latest Global Financial Stability Report describes the risks posed by the crypto ecosystem and offers some policy options to help navigate this uncharted territory.
The Crypto Ecosystem—What Is It, What's at Risk?
The total market value of all the crypto assets surpassed $2 trillion as of September 2021-a 10-fold increase since early 2020. An entire ecosystem is also flourishing, replete with exchanges, wallets, miners, and stablecoin issuers.
Source: IMF
