Analysis

In hindsight, March 2nd, 2020, as the world started to get to grips with the scale of the global health emergency that was unfolding in the form of the Covid-19 pandemic, was an inauspicious time to launch a new investment product. In fact, the S&P/ASX 200 Index is down 19% since that day – after…

Dividends from Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASX: CBA) shares and the ‘Big Four’ have been put under the microscope. So far, CBA has held up the best of the majors. Below, I take you through how an analyst would look at the shares and ways to put a valuation on it. Obviously, I’ll keep things…

After years of ever-increasing focus on returns to the extent that even fixed income allocations got caught in the vortex, there is a sobering reassessment of the risk profile across a portfolio.

AXA Investment Managers has shown that, in the coronavirus crisis, funds and strategies which have an ESG bent outperformed those that didn’t. This is intuitive. The client note supports the notion that an observance to ESG principles adds value for investors, especially in market downturns. It’s mainly a risk thing. The AXA-IM note, authored by…

Northern Trust has announced a new service to help institutional investors and their managers analyse their portfolios for ESG factors. It’s available through the big custodian’s Investment Risk & Analytical Services (IRAS) group. According to Serge Boccassini, the senior vice president for global product, accounting and analytics, who has been at Northern for more than…

Applying professional after-tax management in the transitioning of portfolios by super funds can save at least 30bps in the portfolio’s change-over costs, according to new research by Parametric, the specialist implementation manager. Transition managers don’t always look closely at after-tax impacts. The research report, ‘The Sting in the Transition Tail’ says that both specialist transition…

Pushpay (ASX: PPH) has just reported its 2020 financial year result. Is it the best small-cap to buy at this share price? What is Pushpay? It is a New Zealand based donation systems and software business for religious, not-for-profits and education providers in the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Pushpay is used by over 7000 churches worldwide….

Strongly divided views about the wisdom of using the early release from superannuation have prompted large numbers of fund members to seek the advice of financial planners. Losing insurance cover, reducing retirement benefits and crystallising losses are the main issues commentators have highlighted. According to AMP’s technical adviser support team, early release of super was…

Investors hoping that the big banks will restore their dividends sooner rather than later are likely to be disappointed, as the earnings pressure on the banking sector will continue into the 2020/21 financial year. The banks’ March-half earnings (December-half in Commonwealth Bank’s case) fell by an average of 33 per cent, driven by big increases…

Most of us have not experienced the current level of government and institutional direction of our lives. The impact on business is likely to be profound.

The prestigious MIT Sloan School of Management, with the assistance of State Street, has produced a paper which questions long-held assumptions about the true volatility of private equity investments. It is particularly relevant right now when some big investors are under attack from conservative politicians. As reported in last week’s Investor Strategy News, Australian Liberal…

While multi-asset strategies have gained popularity in recent years, mostly due to Schroders’ success in Australia and internationally, they are not all the same. Morningstar has produced a report to help investors choose an appropriate multi-asset manager. The Morningstar report focuses on the recent market volatility, so it may not be a good long-term assessment….