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Is Europe headed for another recession?

Posted by Anton Murray Consulting on . Posted in Market Commentary, News

The Brussels Times

As we slowly leave the cold season behind us, a wintry chill has suddenly descended on the eurozone economy. Looming storm clouds threaten further disruption. And just as the authorities struggle to get Brussels moving again when a snowstorm hits, eurozone policymakers are ill-equipped to stimulate the economy if it stalls. Indeed, there is a big danger they would actually make matters worse.

Worrying signals

The warning signals are already flashing orange. After a surprisingly strong 2017, the economy weakened substantially last year. When growth almost ground to a halt in the third quarter – and major economies such as Germany and Italy actually shrank – many thought it was just a blip. But the news since then has been ominous. Exports have flagged. Industrial production is falling. Business confidence is down. The blip now looks like a downturn – and if businesses cut back their investment and consumers their spending, it could readily become a recession.

The rest of this article can be found at brusselstimes.com.

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BT launches 6 new portfolios

Posted by Anton Murray Consulting on . Posted in Investment Banking News, News

InvestorDaily

BT has launched six active, diversified, managed portfolios to meet the core investment needs of a range of clients. The six portfolios, CoreSeries, are available on BT Panorama and cater to different risk profiles with no portfolio level investment management fees and a low underlying fee between 50np and 78bps. The CoreSeries portfolios use retail and institutional investment strategies, providing access and transparency to a range of external managers.

BT head of investment product Rodney Greenhalgh said it was structured to offer transparency, efficiency and a competitive fee structure. CoreSeries offers advisers and their retail clients access to a range of high-quality investment managers with several strategies not otherwise available in Australia to retail investors. “We have utilised our institutional portfolio construction capabilities and scale to deliver a purpose-built SMA with a range of benefits to our clients and their advisers,” said Mr Greenhalgh.

The rest of this article can be found at investordaily.com.au.

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Xinja pulls largest Aus equity crowdfunding

Posted by Anton Murray Consulting on . Posted in Investment Banking News, News

InvestorDaily

Xinja Bank has raised nearly $2.6 million in its second equity crowdfunding campaign, the largest achieved in the country, with the company saying that Australians are looking to digital banking following the royal commission.The amount raised from the sale of shares on the Equitise crowdfunding platform beat the previous record of $2.44 million Xinja raised in its first campaign early last year. Shares in this round were offered at $2.04, rising up from $1.20 in the first campaign.

According to the neobank, it now has more than 2,500 investors, with over 1,500 in this round and 1,222 in the first, and more than 200 participating in both rounds. The majority of investors, Xinja said, were aged between 24-44, with the percentage of women backing the campaign increasing to 27 per cent, from 17 per cent in the first round. “This equity crowdfund campaign shows that Xinja’s call to shake up the banking sector resonates with many thousands of Australians,” said Eric Wilson, chief executive and founder, Xinja.

The rest of this article can be found at investordaily.com.au.

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Finance Industry Remains Top Breached Sector

Posted by Anton Murray Consulting on . Posted in News

InvestorDaily

The Finance Industry for the fourth consecutive quarter is among the top three industry sectors by notifiable breaches. The Notifiable Data Breaches Quarterly report for the fourth quarter of last year, released last week revealed the finance industry at second place, sitting just behind health service. From October to November the finance sector including superannuation had 40 breaches, while healthcare had 54 and legal services 23.

Of the data breaches, 11 were due to human error, 28 were malicious or criminal attacks and just one was a system fault. The most common human fault was sending information to the wrong recipient while the most common malicious attack was a cyber incident comprising of phishing, stolen credentials, ransomware and hacking. Chief product officer of SailPoint, a software firm, Paul Trulove said he was not surprised to see the finance industry so high.

The rest of this article can be found at investordaily.com.au.

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Over 100 Financial Institutions Restricting Coal Funding

Posted by Anton Murray Consulting on . Posted in Funds Management News, Investment Banking News, News

InvestorDaily

New research has revealed that over 100 major global financial institutions have introduced policies restricting coal funding. The research from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis has found that global capital is leaving the coal sector at fast pace. Since 2013, coal exit announcements have occurred at a rate of over one per month form banks and insurers holding more than US$10 billion worth of assets under management.

Since the start of 2018, there have been 34 new or improved announcements from global institutions restricting coal, making an average of one new announcement every two weeks. The first restriction came from The World Bank in 2013 with the 100th coming from the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development. Since the beginning of 2019, moves have come from banks in the UK, Canada, Finland, South Africa and Austria.

The rest of this article can be found at investordaily.com.au.

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