Global ETF News Older than One Year
Climate-related passive funds fail to win over top pension plans
June 17, 2020--More than half of the world's largest pension schemes have made no allocation to climate-related passive funds in spite of mounting pressure on institutional investors to step up the fight against global warming.
Urgent action is required by companies and investors worldwide to prevent catastrophic...
Source: FT.com
The IEA warns global oil demand will drop by $324 million a day in 2020, the biggest decline in history, before a rapid rebound in 2021
June 16, 2020--The International Energy Agency, in its closely-watched oil market report, predicted that global oil demand will drop by 8.1 million barrels a day this year, the biggest decline in history.
Demand is expected to rebound by a record 5.7 million barrels a day in 2021, IEA said.
The agency adjusted its previous forecast of global Brent demand falling by 9.1 million barrels a day as better-than-expected deliveries took place amid easing lockdowns.
Source: businessinsider.com
Hedging in a time of crisis
June 16, 2020--Hedge funds have traditionally been sceptical about their ability to embrace responsible investment practices. However, since the 2008 financial crisis, when hedge funds played an important role as providers of liquidity, with strategies focused on private or distressed debt or event-driven and special situations, helping to restructure and rescue companies, the importance of investing sustainably is now more firmly on their radar, with many strengthening their governance structures in the face of increased scrutiny from regulators.
The hedge fund industry is also at the forefront of data sourcing, using new sources of alternative unstructured data derived from artificial intelligence, in a bid to generate new insights before competitors. This applies across all data sourcing, using ESG-specific data as well as data in more standard areas.
Source: responsible-investor.com
Why Crypto Options: Explaining Growth and Anticipating Trillions
June 16, 2020---As we near the end of the first half of 2020, the explosive growth in crypto options trading on venues such as Deribit has continued its torrid pace.
Source: insights.deribit.com
IMF sees 'profound uncertainty' about global recovery
June 16, 2020--Chief economist warns the Covid crisis was more global and playing out differently than past crises
The International Monetary Fund will likely forecast a worse contraction in the global economy than previously estimated for 2020 and sees "profound uncertainty" about the path of recovery, IMF chief economist Gita Gopinath said in a new blog.
Ms Gopinath said the economic crisis triggered by the novel coronavirus pandemic was more global and playing out differently than past crises, with the services sector hit harder than manufacturing in both advanced and emerging market economies, and inflation low across the board.
Source: irishtimes.com
IMF Working paper-Who will Bear the Brunt of Lockdown Policies? Evidence from Tele-workability Measures Across Countries
June 12, 2020--Summary:
Lockdowns imposed around the world to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic are having a differential impact on economic activity and jobs.
This paper presents a new index of the feasibility to work from home to investigate what types of jobs are most at risk.
We estimate that over 97.3 million workers, equivalent to about 15 percent of the workforce, are at high risk of layoffs and furlough across the 35 advanced and emerging countries in our sample. Workers least likely to work remotely tend to be young, without a college education, working for non-standard contracts, employed in smaller firms, and those at the bottom of the earnings distribution, suggesting that the pandemic could exacerbate inequality. Crosscountry heterogeneity in the ability to work remotely reflects differential access to and use of technology, sectoral mix, and labor market selection. Policies should account for demographic and distributional considerations both during the crisis and in its aftermath.
Source: IMF
IMF Working Paper-Who will Bear the Brunt of Lockdown Policies? Evidence from Tele-workability Measures Across Countries
June 12, 2020--Summary:
Lockdowns imposed around the world to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic are having a differential impact on economic activity and jobs. This paper presents a new index of the feasibility to work from home to investigate what types of jobs are most at risk. We estimate that over 97.3 million workers, equivalent to about 15 percent of the workforce, are at high risk of layoffs and furlough across the 35 advanced and emerging countries in our sample.
Workers least likely to work remotely tend to be young, without a college education, working for non-standard contracts, employed in smaller firms, and those at the bottom of the earnings distribution, suggesting that the pandemic could exacerbate inequality. Crosscountry heterogeneity in the ability to work remotely reflects differential access to and use of technology, sectoral mix, and labor market selection. Policies should account for demographic and distributional considerations both during the crisis and in its aftermath.
Source: IMF
An Inconvenient Fact: Private Equity Returns & The Billionaire Factory
June 10, 2020--June 10, 2020--Abstract
Private Equity (PE) funds have returned about the same as public equity indices since at least 2006. Large public pension funds have received a net Multiple of Money (MoM) that sits within a narrow 1.51 to 1.54 range. The big four PE firms have also delivered estimated net MoMs within a narrow 1.54 to 1.67 range.
Three large datasets show average net MoMs across all PE funds at 1.55, 1.57 and 1.63. These net MoMs imply an 11% p.a. return, which matches relevant public equity indices; a result confirmed by PME calculations. Yet, the estimated total performance-related fee collected by these PE funds is estimated to be $230 billion, most of which goes to a relatively small number of individuals. The number of PE multibillionaires rose from 3 in 2005 to over 22 in 2020. Rebuttals from the big four and the main industry lobby body are provided and discussed.
Source: papers.ssrn.com
Growing Number of Institutional Investors Believe That Digital Assets Should Be a Part of Their Investment Portfolios, According to New Research from Fidelity Digital AssetsSM
June 9, 2020--More U.S. investors are finding appeal in digital assets vs. a year ago
Investors in Europe are more likely to own digital assets and have a more progressive view of the asset class vs. U.S. investors
Digital assets are gaining in favorability and appeal amongst institutional investors, with almost 80% of investors surveyed finding something appealing about the asset class.
In a comprehensive survey of almost 800 institutional investors across the U.S. and Europe, 36% of respondents say they are currently invested in digital assets, and 6 out of 10 believe digital assets have a place in their investment portfolio. These and other findings from a Fidelity Digital AssetsSM survey cast an in-depth light on a class of investors who have widely been expected to lead broad adoption of digital assets.
Source: Fidelity Digital Assets & Fidelity Center for Applied Technology
World Bank-COVID-19 to Plunge Global Economy into Worst Recession since World War II
June 8, 2020--Per Capita Incomes to Shrink in All Regions
The swift and massive shock of the coronavirus pandemic and shutdown measures to contain it have plunged the global economy into a severe contraction.
According to World Bank forecasts, the global economy will shrink by 5.2% this year.[1] That would represent the deepest recession since the Second World War, with the largest fraction of economies experiencing declines in per capita output since 1870, the World Bank says in its June 2020 Global Economic Prospects.
Economic activity among advanced economies is anticipated to shrink 7% in 2020 as domestic demand and supply, trade, and finance have been severely disrupted. Emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs) are expected to shrink by 2.5% this year, their first contraction as a group in at least sixty years. Per capita incomes are expected to decline by 3.6%, which will tip millions of people into extreme poverty this year.
view the World Bank June 2020 Global Economic Prospects
Source: World Bank