Silicon Valley Bank Collapse – Market Impact
Markets have been volatile this week following the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) in the US. SVB lent money to many small technology businesses in the US, as well as their entrepreneurial owners. The US Federal Reserve stepped in quickly to secure customers’ deposits and reassure markets. In the UK, HSBC bought up […]
Budget – March 2023 – Pension and Personal Finance Impact
Pension Changes The Chancellor announced that the Lifetime Allowance (LTA) will effectively be removed from 6 April 2023, so it will mark the end of the possibility of a recovery tax charge for a large pension fund. The LTA tax charge will be set at 0% from 6 April 2023 and the LTA abolished […]
Investment Review of 2022 and Better Times Ahead – Investment Outlook for 2023
Investors will be glad to see the back of 2022. The year can be summed up by the Collins dictionary’s word of the year, ‘permacrisis’, which is defined as an extended period of instability and in security, especially one resulting from a series of catastrophic events. Permacrisis reflects the feeling of an ongoing state of […]
Market Overview & Outlook Quarter 3 2022 (1 July – 30 September 2022) – Investment Volatility Continues
Equities rose strongly at the start of the third quarter of 2022 mirroring the hot summer witnessed in many parts of the world as thermostats registered record temperatures. The rebound in equity prices in July and August can be attributed to the fact that markets had become oversold at the end of June, as well […]
Market Overview & Outlook Quarter 2 2022 (1 April – 30 June 2022) – Markets Retreat as Inflation Bites
After the relative calm of May, June witnessed a brutal sell off in markets around the world, and this time the UK equity market was not immune, as the FTSE 100 declined by -3.80% over the quarter whilst the MSCI World suffered a loss of -9.43% in GBP terms. Whilst persistently high inflation remained an […]
Market Overview – Markets Battered by Inflation – Rebound Potential
Global stocks have been hit hard in recent months falling 16% in 2022 as measured by the FTSE All-World Index. The technology laden US NASDAQ Index is down by over 24% since its peak last November. Even indices, such as the UK FTSE100 which is has significant weightings in oil and gas has declined since […]
Market Overview & Outlook Quarter 1 2022 (1 January – 31 March 2022) – Investments Rattled
The last couple of months of 2021 saw an uptick in volatility as the mood music in markets changed, which has continued into 2022. After years of both inflation and interest rates reducing and remaining very low, inflationary pressures surged and as a result there is upward pressure on interest rates to contain inflation. Inflation […]
Market Overview & Investment Outlook January 2022 – Difficult Start to 2022
The last 3 years have been excellent for global equities, the UK FTSE All-Share up by 25%, MSCI World up by over 50% and the US tech-laden NASDAQ up by 110%. This period includes the start of the COVID period in early 2020 when markets fell dramatically, the recovery in the second half of 2020 […]
Market Overview & Outlook Quarter 4 2021 (1 October – 31 December 2021) & 2022 Investment Outlook – Investments Deliver Strong Performance
2021 was another good year for investment markets, particularly for US equities which delivered another stellar performance. This impressive performance was driven primarily by the mega caps in the US which masked some lacklustre performance elsewhere amongst US equities. International equities also notched up impressive gains in continental Europe and the UK, whilst China and […]
Market Overview & Outlook Quarter 3 2021 (1 July – 30 September 2021) Equities Make Further Progress
Perhaps one of the clearest indicators that the world is returning to normal is that financial markets are worrying about lots of different things. To be fair, the summer of 2021 has given plenty of things to be worried about, whether that was the military withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Chinese government’s waves of market regulation, […]