China continued to have room to increase government spending to prop up the economy, but it was unclear just how much, the country’s finance minister said on Monday. Speaking at a news conference during the annual session of China’s parliament, finance minister Lou Jiwei said fiscal income would slow in future, but China continued to have
The first quarter of the year, in terms of the equity markets, pretty much played out as we predicted at the end of 2013, with a lot of to-ing and fro-ing, but markets generally remaining range-bound over the quarter. In fact U.S. equity investors saw the weakest first quarter in five years. Emerging market equities once again
The first quarter of this year was characterised by a strong risk on environment, or more accurately a very positive quarter for US and Japanese equities. These markets finished the quarter up over 8% in dollars, whilst the Emerging and European markets were barely positive. Bond markets were virtually flat, to slightly down, and much
“You’ve got to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative and latch on to the affirmative, don’t mess with Mister In-Between” In keeping with the lyrics of a WW2 era Bing Crosby / Andrews Sisters hit song, it was very much a case of “glass half full” in financial markets during the first quarter, as a
Welcome to the first quarter of 2013 and the New Year. I’m sure you’ve all been inundated with the many multitudes of market commentators who have offered their review of last year and the 10 critical investment decisions for the year ahead or significant inflection points. The great thing about the investment management business is
