Analysis

(pictured: Cynthia Clemson) By Greg Bright J.K. Galbraith, the radical Canadian-American economist, called it “private affluence amid public squalor”. What he was referring to, in the 1960s, was the long slow decline of much of his adopted country’s infrastructure. Since the GFC, however, things are improving, thanks in part to the evolution of the municipal bond…

(pictured: Christopher Schelling) A big US pension fund is investigating the use of personality and aptitude tests for fund managers to become part of its due diligence process. The fund’s head of private equity investments, Christopher Schelling, has written a paper explaining the rationale. Schelling, the director of private equity at the Texas Municipal Retirement System,…

(pictured: Jonathan Shead) New research by State Street Global Advisors indicates that there is still a lot of work to be done for, even, big fiduciary investors to understand the value in factor investing. The research also shows these investors seem a bit unrealistic about expected returns. In its regular survey of 400 of the world’s largest…

(pictured: Raewyn Williams) The amount of tax saved from efficient after-tax management by super funds can vary through various market cycles, requiring different techniques to maximise returns. A new paper by Parametric illustrates the potential returns by treating the strategy as ‘tax alpha’. The paper, “The New Recruit to Your Alpha Team”, was written by Sydney-based…

(pictured: Nigel Douglas) Global small caps tend to outperform large caps over most timeframes, but with slightly higher volatility, as most investors know. But for Australian investors, global small caps also have a distinct advantage over the domestic variety – they don’t have the same capacity problems A recent study by asset consultant Nigel Douglas, principal…

(pictured: Greg Goodsell)  Contrary to common belief, a new study has shown, listed infrastructure stocks do not necessarily behave like bonds all the time. You can still make money from them as global bond yields head north… eventually. The study, by 4 Dimensions Infrastructure, examines key aspects of the notion that listed infrastructure stocks are…

(pictured: Andrew Pickering) Australia’s ‘Mr Infrastructure’, Mike Fitzpatrick, and his colleagues at Infrastructure Capital Group, which they acquired from ANZ Bank just after the global financial crisis, have turned their eyes to Asia. With their latest raising they are garnering Asian investment into Australia. According to Andrew Pickering, ICG’s executive chairman and CIO, the investors, mostly…

(pictured: Laurence Bailey) By Greg Bright It’s been a popular saying of Laurence Bailey for many years. And, as the custody veteran prepares for the next phase of his life, most likely to involve teaching or coaching, it is as true today as it was when he started in the industry in the 1980s – remarkably,…

(pictured: Graeme Arnott) The Australian Taxation Office is becoming increasingly interested in the strategies and operations of big super funds as they impact, for the first time, on the Government’s revenue base. Four out of the top 10 Australian taxpayers are now super funds and two are in the top five. Graeme Arnott, the deputy chief…

(pictured Aidan Farrell with – from top left – Nigel Douglas, Fraser Murray, Richard Cahill, Clare Armstrong, Tim Hughes, Dennis Sams) By Greg Bright There are some unusual characteristics about global small caps. They outperform large caps over most periods, as you’d expect, and they have slightly higher volatility, as you’d expect. But they are…

(pictured: Peter Hiom)  Last year the ASX quietly commenced what is looking very much like a transformation of its technology, including CHESS, a purpose built sub-registry platform which ASX introduced in 1996. This time the ASX has cemented its position by buying a stake in the American company building a prototype using distributed ledger technology….

(pictured: Raphael Arndt) by Greg Bright The Future Fund has been reducing its investment risk over the past 12 months, as has been well documented, once again dodging a bullet with the global equities market. Less obviously, the fund has also been looking to reduce its longer-term Anglo, western and, probably, male biases in the management…