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All about the oil

09 December 2014

Financial markets have been dominated by the collapse in the oil price over the past few weeks. The fall in the oil price is partly due to lower-than-expected demand because of slower global growth. It is easy to forget that China’s nominal economic growth rate has halved since 2011, while Japanese and European growth is also disappointing. According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), global oil demand in the third quarter of 2014 was estimated 93.06 millions of barrels per day (mbpd), up from 91.02 mbpd two years ago. All the action has been happening on the supply side. According to the IEA, oil supply has surged to 93.6mbpd from 90mbpd in the third quarter of 2012. Most of this increase comes from North America, where shale oil has doubled American output over the past five years, and is set to continue increasing as oil is extracted from shale and tar sands.

Lower oil prices to boost festive spending

02 December 2014

November is known as the month of the moustache in support of cancer awareness, but at least investors didn’t need hair on their teeth this month. Following the ups and downs of September and October, the past month definitely felt calmer. In fact, there were fairly solid performances across a broad range of local and global asset classes.

Japan remains compelling investment despite recession

28 November 2014

By reducing investment exposure to Japan based purely on two quarters of negative GDP growth, investors stand to lose far more in missed long-term opportunities than they may gain by reducing their short-term risk exposure. This is according to Urvesh Desai, Portfolio Manager and Strategist for Old Mutual Investment Group’s MacroSolutions boutique, who says that any sound investment approach must recognise GDP as just one of a multitude of factors that will drive markets and prices in the long term.

Counting the cost: settle your mortgage or invest the capital?

27 November 2014

The higher interest rate cycle begs the question – is it currently better to use your investable funds to pay off your mortgage or to add to your retirement savings?

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Do you think short-term insurance broking will survive the AI plus humanoid robotics age?

Answer

Human first always Not a chance Possibly maybe Yes, but reimagined

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