Global ETF News Older than One Year
Economy: Rising tensions could degenerate into protectionism, warns OECD-UNCTAD report
November 4, 2010--G20 leaders must remain vigilant against the risk that tensions over current account imbalances could slow investment or degenerate into a protectionist spiral, according to the OECD and UNCTAD.
In their fourth report to the G20, the organisations find that most new investment measures taken from mid-May to mid-October by governments were aimed at facilitating and encouraging investment flows.
However, some countries have recently put in place capital controls and regulations to buffer their economies from foreign exchange volatility and capital flows. While such measures may serve legitimate purposes under exceptional circumstances, they could lead to a fragmentation of international capital markets along national lines, and may be difficult to dismantle once in place, says the report.
“Foreign exchange intervention is not the most helpful instrument for macro-economic management,” OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría said. “It can prompt countervailing intervention and may trigger new protectionist responses.”
Besides steering clear of further intervention in currency markets, governments must also wind down emergency schemes as quickly as is prudent. Exit strategies should be transparent and accountable. While 12 G20 countries implemented emergency programmes for the financial sector, India is the only country to date that has fully dismantled them and retains no related assets or government guarantees.
view the Fourth Report on G20 Investment Measures
Source: OECD
Backlash against Fed’s $600bn easing
November 4, 2010--The US Federal Reserve’s decision to pump an extra $600bn into the economy has galvanized emerging market central banks into preparing defensive measures and sparked criticism from leading global economies.
The Fed’s initiative in response to rising concern about the weakness of the US economy, has fuelled fears of a sharp drop in the dollar and a fresh flood of capital inflows into emerging markets.
Source: FT.com
Wells Fargo Launches Fund Services Product Line
November 4, 2010--Wells Fargo Bank announced today the launch of a new Fund Services product line within its Corporate Trust Services to address customers’ fund administration needs. Wells Fargo Fund Services provides fund administration services including a full suite of back-, middle-, and front-office products and services to private equity firms, exchange traded commodities (ETC), commodity funds, hedge funds, fund of funds and the structured finance marketplace.
Jorge Villalba, a 12-year industry veteran recently joined Wells Fargo to lead the Fund Services Group. Tom Gandolfo is head of Sales. The team is based in Columbia, MD; Houston, TX; and New York City and leverages expertise across Wells Fargo, including seasoned trust and compliance professionals. Additional hiring is anticipated by year-end.
Source: Wells Fargo
Doing Business 2011: Making a Difference for Entrepreneurs
November 4, 2010--In the past year, against the backdrop of the global financial crisis, policy makers around the world continued to improve business regulation and empower entrepreneurs, according to Doing Business 2011: Making a Difference for Entrepreneurs.
The IFC–World Bank report, which ranks 183 economies on key aspects of business regulation for domestic firms, discloses that 117 economies carried out 216 regulatory reforms aimed at making it easier to start and operate a business, strengthening transparency and property rights, and improving the efficiency of commercial dispute resolution and bankruptcy procedures.
The report also pioneers a new measure showing how much business regulation has changed in 174 economies since 2005.
Highlights:
Kazakhstan took top honors for the most-improved business environment in 2009/10
Singapore leads the world in the ease of doing business for the fifth year running
About 85 percent of the world’s economies have made it easier for entrepreneurs to operate in the past five years
Source: World Bank Group
Impact of Regulatory Reforms on Large and Complex Financial Institutions-Postition paper
November 4, 2010--EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Financial sector reforms are being considered to address the risks posed by large and complex financial institutions (LCFIs). The vast majority of global finance is intermediated
by a handful of these institutions with growing interconnections within and across borders.
Common trends that contributed to the recent global crisis included sharp increases in leverage, significant reliance on short-term wholesale funding, growth of off-balance-sheet activities, maturity mismatches, and increased share of revenues from complex products and trading activities.
view Impact of Regulatory Reforms on Large and Complex Financial Institutions position paper
Source: IMF
Fiscal Exit: From Strategy to Implementation
November 4, 2010--Summary:
With increasing fiscal challenges in the aftermath of the global financial crisis, multilateral surveillance of fiscal developments, a key part of the IMF's surveillance responsibilities, has gained further importance. In response, the Fiscal Monitor was launched in 2009 to survey and analyze the latest public finance developments, update fiscal implications of the crisis and medium-term fiscal projections, and assess policies to put public finances on a sustainable footing.
The Fiscal Monitor is prepared twice a year by the IMF's Fiscal Affairs Department. The Monitor's projections are based on the same database used for the October 2010 World Economic Outlook (WEO) and Global Financial Stability Report.
view the Fiscal Exit: From Strategy to Implementation
Source: World Bank
Consumer Prices, OECD - Updated: 3 November 2010
November 3, 2010--OECD annual inflation rate edges up to 1.7% in September 2010
Consumer prices in the OECD area rose by 1.7% in the year to September 2010, up from 1.6% in August. This small pick-up in inflation mainly reflects higher food and energy prices, which increased by 2.3% and 5.2% respectively in September, compared with 1.4% and 4.8% in August.
Excluding food and energy, the annual inflation rate held steady for the third consecutive month at 1.2% in the year to September 2010.
Source: OECD
Major study reveals that private equity’s center of gravity is shifting toward emerging markets as returns in these markets accelerate
November 3, 2010--Emerging markets’ share of private-equity deals has increased from 5 percent to 30 percent over the last decade, rivaling the proportion of deals in the United States and Europe—and it is expected to increase.
Returns from emerging markets have more than tripled since the 1990s to more than 17 percent today.
The most attractive markets combine economic scale and favorable socioeconomic conditions, such as Brazil, Turkey, and Malaysia. Other high-profile markets such as Russia and Argentina appear to offer less potential.
Western investors will have to rethink their business models to succeed, including accepting minority rather than majority stakes in businesses, and generating value via operational improvements rather than leverage.
Local private-equity firms in emerging markets could be tomorrow’s giants.
Emerging markets are generating increasingly attractive returns for private-equity investors and could soon account for the lion’s share of deals, according to research from BCG and IESE Business School. But which markets offer the greatest potential for investors? And what are the key success factors? In New Markets, New Rules: Will Emerging Markets Reshape Private Equity?, BCG and IESE address these questions by analyzing the largest data set of its kind and applying a novel framework for assessing the attractiveness of markets.
view New Markets, New Rules: Will Emerging Markets Reshape Private Equity? report
Source: The Boston Consulting Group
Sugar soars to 30-year high as supply fears grow
November 2, 2010--The price of sugar has jumped to a 30-year high as the Brazilian harvest has tailed off sharply, hardening expectations of a shortage.
Traders believe that prices could soar over the coming months as the market faces a supply shortfall driven by smaller-than-forecast crops in important growing countries from Brazil to Russia and western Europe.
Source: FT.com
Dow Jones Indexes Named Best Islamic Index Provider In IFN Award Poll
November 1, 2010--Dow Jones Indexes, a leading global index provider, today announced that it has been named “Best Islamic Index Provider” in the Islamic Finance News (IFN) award poll for the 4th consecutive year.
The Best Service Providers award poll is conducted annually by the Malaysia-based weekly e-newsletter Islamic Finance News. For this 2010 edition, more than 1,900 votes from Islamic finance institutions, issuers, investors and government bodies from around the world determined the leaders in 13 categories.
“We are honored to receive this prestigious award for the fourth year in a row. The Dow Jones Islamic Market index series is one of our finest achievements in terms of innovation, design and market acceptance,” said Michael A. Petronella, president, Dow Jones Indexes. “As Islamic finance grows and evolves worldwide, we are committed to continue providing meaningful, new Islamic indexes.”
Launched in 1999, the Dow Jones Islamic Market Indexes were the first indexes intended to measure the global universe of investable equities that pass screens for Shari’ah compliance. With more than 100 indexes, the series is the most comprehensive family of Islamic market measures and includes regional, country, and industry indexes, all of which are subsets of the Dow Jones Islamic Market Index. An independent Shari’ah Supervisory Board counsels Dow Jones Indexes on matters related to the compliance of index-eligible companies.
In the past 6 years, the Dow Jones Islamic Market index series has won 21 industry awards by organizations, research institutions and magazines around the world; amongst them are the International Islamic Finance Forum, the Kuala Lumpur Islamic Finance Forum, the Islamic Center of Southern California, Global Finance Magazine, Islamic Business & Finance Magazine and Incisive Media.
There are currently more than 150 licensees with more than US$7 billion in assets benchmarked to the Dow Jones Islamic Market Indexes. For more information on the Dow Jones Islamic Market Indexes, please visit www.djindexes.com.
Source: Dow Jones Indexes
