News / Views

Investment Notes

Follow our regular updates to stay up-to-date with current financial planning and investment issues. We regularly publish press clippings, articles and thinkpieces that we think might be of interest to our clients.

Syria – Assad situation

Published on
6 September 2013

Syria is a secular state, but the religious breakdown of the Syrian population is approximately 74% Sunni Muslims, 16% Shia Muslims, 10% Christian (source – CIA World Factbook). However, the al- Assad family which has ruled Syria since 1971 are Alawites (one of the branches of Shia Islam), and government positions are mainly held by Alawites.

The German dilemma

Published on
3 September 2013

Since the drama of the Italian election in the spring, European politics have been remarkably quiet. This has been by design – the countries who would like Germany to provide money or ease policy to support their beleaguered economies have understood that it is very important not to scare the German voters ahead of their general election on September 22.

UK Recovery – Green Shoots; but Weak Roots?

Published on
22 August 2013
On May 30 we published “UK Economy – Green Shoots” anticipating the improvement in the economy that has become clearer to see in the last few months. Data for the second quarter showed growth of 0.6%, a very healthy pace, house prices all over the country have begun to pick up, and shorter term sentiment indicators are showing a clear improvement in confidence across all sectors of the economy. This note examines the sustainability of the recovery.

Get Real (Estate)

Published on
2 August 2013

Returns from the UK commercial real estate market have arrived at a critical inflection point. A year ago, the average rental yield on commercial property across all regions and types of property was 6% per annum. However, capital values were declining by about 0.5% per month, giving a zero total return to investors.

The Global Monetary Policy Kaleidoscope

Published on
25 July 2013

In 2009, in the face of a global economic crisis, the major economies of the world came together and acted in concert to ease monetary policy aggressively. Together with fiscal stimulus in the US and China, these policies helped to prevent the world from slipping into depression.

Fed up – down with QE?

Published on
5 July 2013

Ben Bernanke’s discussion of the Fed’s policy intentions in the press conference following the Federal Reserve meeting on June 19 was a shock to markets, with all asset classes around the world falling sharply in response.

A believer in the Abe lever – Japanese shares

Published on
14 June 2013

The end of bear markets are periods when investors are delighted that they do not own a certain type of asset. This usually means that the performance has been very poor for a long period of time, and for reasons that most investors believe will persist.

UK economy – green shoots

Published on
30 May 2013

Over the last ten quarters to March 2013, the UK economy has produced essentially zero growth due to a combination of (i) the UK government’s austerity plans encompassing both spending cuts and tax increases, (ii) severe economic weakness in the Eurozone, the UK’s largest trading partner, (iii) weakness in North Sea oil production due to essential maintenance work, (iv) a large bank

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