Following forceful questioning by shareholders at its annual meeting last month, comes news that a class action against IOOF, undertaken by Shine Lawyers, has progressed through the funding stage. A previous proposed action, through lawyers Quinn Emanual, was dropped early this year. Patrick Liddy, the principal of MSI Group consultants, and Shine Lawyers have been…
Geoff Wilson of Wilson Asset Management fame and the Stock Brokers and Financial Advisers Association have joined with the SMSF Association in attempting to get fairer access for small investors in company capital raisings. ASIC is in their sights. In a webinar organised by the SMSF body yesterday (November 25), coinciding with SMSF Week, Geoff…
New retail investors entered the sharemarket in droves over the first six months of the pandemic’s impact. Contrary to widely held views, for the most part, on average, they did very well. Very well indeed. But one has to be careful of averages. They can often mask skews from big single numbers and rarely do…
New option for MySuper products allows mass customisation Russell Investments has developed what it says is a ‘game changer’ for superannuation in Australia – the first mass customised retirement solution. It is currently available only to members in the Russell Master Trust, but the firm will offer access through other super funds down the track….
Hamish Douglass, the CIO of Magellan Financial Group, who oversees the largest Australian-owned global funds manager and is the current darling of the wholesale and retail investor sectors, is relatively sanguine about the possible market impact of the US election, but a bit more worried about COVID-19. Douglass, also Magellan’s co-founder, with Chris Mackay, chairman…
Focusing on three sectors of Australian shares for direct purchases, sectors favoured by SMSF trustees and other individual investors, Morningstar offered its top picks at the annual Morningstar Investment Conference last week (October 8-9). Cognisant of market volatility, valuations, dividend policies and the importance of fundamentals in uncertain times, three Morningstar researchers – Johannes Faul,…
Australia has followed the US in bouncing back with new sharemarket listings after a hefty slump during much of the first half of the calendar year, at least in terms of the number of initial public offerings (IPOs). In the absence of any mega listings, Australia is still unlikely to break any records in terms…
Notwithstanding the political and superannuation industry talk of an infrastructure-led economic recovery in Australia, and elsewhere, the listed infrastructure sector has been looking decidedly unloved of late. And much of the sector’s underperformance against the broader market this year has not been justified in terms of company earnings. Guiseppe Corona, the London-based head of global…
Professional investment managers look at valuations all the time. They all know that the price at which a stock was bought has a big impact on the overall percentage return to the investor over the medium-long term. But for the past eight years in Australia and ten years in the US, the value style has…
A clear correlation has emerged between risk appetite during the COVID-19 pandemic and the age of investors, with Australian ‘millennials’ – aged 24-39 – among the most proactive globally, according to a survey of 1,800 people in six countries. Australian investors of all ages are also among the most bullish globally. The survey was conducted…
