Fund managers around the world are scrutinising human rights and environmental concerns in their investment decisions. BlackRock—which last year committed to selling stakes in fossil fuel companies—has signalled that it now plans to press companies about their policies related to human rights, as well as biodiversity, deforestation and water. Economists forecast that a failure to…
Australian virologist and Nobel prize winner Sir Frank Macfarlane Burnet declared in 1962 that one of the most important revolutions in history was the “virtual elimination of social diseases”. After all, within two decades, smallpox and polio would be eliminated from most advanced nations. Yet, according to the Financial Times, Burnett had not fully considered…
Economists and analysts have, from early in 2021, signalled the danger that stock markets may face a ‘taper tantrum’ this year – in other words, a surge in US treasury yields in response to an indication that the Fed may begin tapering quantitative easing, despite the Fed’s continued reassurances to the contrary. The fear is…
Despite steep losses in US stocks on Wednesday and Thursday, much of the narrative this week focused on how the world economy will move beyond the pandemic into recovery. With more than 225 million vaccine doses already administered across 100 countries (according to Bloomberg) – and an accelerated pace of inoculation – hopes are rising that the worst of the…
Bitcoin again captured news headlines as the cryptocurrency surpassed the $54 000 level on Friday. The currency has moved more mainstream with companies such as Tesla and MicroStrategy having recently acquired/added to their holdings, and PayPal allowing 346 million users to buy and spend Bitcoin on their platform. But the explosive rise in the Bitcoin…
This week’s News Flash does not include much on current affairs, focusing instead on the highly topical and contentious subject of taxing wealthy individuals. As we show in our headline article for the week, a wealth tax is not a new (nor a necessarily good) idea, but it is one that has gained traction in…
Whilst 2020 will undoubtedly go down in history as the year of the Covid-19 pandemic, we suggest that 2021 will be the year of the vaccine. This week’s news covers articles on the unprecedented and sheer logistical scale of the global vaccine roll out. Yet poorer emerging markets are likely to lag behind their wealthier…
“Trilemma” is a term in decision-making theory. Unlike a dilemma, which has two solutions, a trilemma offers three equal solutions to a complex problem. However, the options of a trilemma are conflictual because of mutual exclusivity, which makes only one option of the trilemma achievable at a given time. From an investment perspective, there is…
The polarisation of Americans by an autocratic leadership and a lack of bipartisan politics will be one of the most unfortunate, enduring legacies of the Trump presidency. Newly elected President Biden’s inauguration speech on Wednesday was underlined by a call for unity, in that to restore the soul and secure the future of America, this…
