Headlines are grim for sustainable investments. But headlines are frequently misleading. To paraphrase Mark Twain, the figures suggest reports of its death may be somewhat premature. First of all, though, a caveat: how one defines “sustainable” greatly affects the calculation, as does the market on which one focuses. Here I’m focusing on the UK market, with a rather restricted definition of “sustainable”: all SFDR Article 9 funds plus those containing indicative sustainable keywords in the name. This gives a narrower universe than, for instance, including all integration-based strategies. What does the data show? Equities finished 2024 as the most successful

Using Lipper Leaders to analyse the best-performing funds in the IA North America sector.   Everyone loves the US market. Gainsayers have thrown in their hands, as evidenced by the flows to the IA North America sector over the 12 months to November: almost £37bn—more than any other sector. For that, you get exposure to the world’s largest, most liquid and, it seems, dynamic equity market. Largest, and getting ever larger. The US is now more than 60% of broad global equity indices. Apple, the largest stock, is generally more than any ex-US country weight, other than Japan. It’s larger

Although it’s been on the slide since mid-May, the US equity market has edged out global equities as UK fund buyers’ market of choice. This has been implemented, however, in ways that run counter to prevailing trends. Equity Global sales have been trending down since their November 2022 peak of £3.21bn—only bettered by March 2021’s £6.48bn. Over the same period, we’ve seen Equity US increase its take. Over the 12 months to the end of April 2024, Equity Global attracted £1.44bn and Equity US, £6.61bn (Equity UK, for comparison, lost £16.16bn). Over the first four months of 2024, those figures

Using the Lipper Leaders scoring system to analyse the best-performing funds in the IA North America sector.   The US equity market has been much in focus over the past year as the S&P 500 giants of the Magnificent Seven reversed their precipitous declines of 2022. When we looked at the sector 12 months ago, everyone (not least me) was pessimistic about the US as recessionary clouds gathered over the world’s largest economy. Well, that’s clearly not happened, so I will accept my slice of humble American pie. Exactly why the US has avoided the anticipated downturn is not altogether

Continued hawkish tones by Federal Reserve officials, rising interest rates, and climbing oil prices weighed on investors and pushed equity mutual funds and ETFs to their first quarterly loss in four—with the average equity fund posting a 3.68% decline in Q3. For the quarter, LSEG Lipper’s Commodities Funds macro-classification (+2.99%) outpaced the other six major equity groups for the first quarter in six. Alternative Equity Funds (+1.04%) took the runner-up position for the quarter, followed by Mixed-Assets Funds (-3.17%), U.S. Diversified Equity (USDE) Funds (-3.87%), Sector Equity Funds (-4.01%), World Equity Funds (-4.40%), and World Sector Equity Funds (-5.70%). For

Using the Lipper Leaders scoring system to analyse the best-performing funds in the IA North America sector.   The coming year is fraught with risk. The US seems likely to head into recession, with opinion divided over not “if” but “when.” Consensus is settling somewhere between the second half of 2023 and early 2024. While there’s no direct correlation between GDP and equity values, they do tend to perform worse in recessions. And, while the S&P 500 has fallen from it December 2021 peak, in percentage terms there is likely still further to go when one compares recessionary peak-to-trough. That

Turbulent geopolitics, soaring inflation and tightening central bank policies have created a narrow and treacherous path for equity investors in 2022, leaving them with few options to diversify and balance their portfolios. The performance of the two most prominent asset classes in the world’s “safest” market shows just how challenging the environment has been. Since 1974, US equities and bonds have provided good levels of diversification. When equities have done poorly, bonds have risen to the challenge to compensate — and the other way around. Thus far, this year has been the only exception, with both equities and bonds suffering

Using the Lipper Leaders scoring system to analyse the best-performing funds in the IA North America sector.   Ongoing liquidity injections from major central banks have pushed US equities ever higher. This has lately been reinforced by concerns over the contraction in Chinese liquidity, the country’s crackdown on tech companies, and the rising COVID uncertainty, which taken together have increased demand for safe-haven assets such as the US dollar. In short, investors have piled into US equities over the past several months and beyond. While there has been some volatility over July, driven by concerns over rising inflation, key US