Expected returns from stocks and bonds will be structurally lower as interest rates fall
In spite of low rates, millennial women fear stock market risk
German manufacturing in 'free fall', according to Ifo Institute survey
UK weekly commentary from BlackRock covering week highlights, what we’re thinking about the markets and what your clients may be asking this week.
UK weekly commentary from BlackRock covering week highlights, what we’re thinking about the markets and what your clients may be asking this week.
Indexing in UK wealth portfolios is set to grow by 50% over the next two years. Read about the four trends at play that BlackRock expect will drive that growth.
Oil and related securities have lagged despite a spike in Gulf tensions. We see selected opportunities, but expect oil to be range-bound. Global stocks edged lower ahead of a key meeting between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping. This week’s US nonfarm payrolls data will help investors better gauge the strength of the labour market after the May data had disappointed.
The world is constantly changing, and many of these shifts have the potential to alter the investment landscape. While some of these changes can be temporary and fleeting, others can be powerful, transformative forces that shape how society is organized at a fundamental level. BlackRock has identified five megatrends that will be relevant to investors and the future of the global economy.
UK weekly commentary from BlackRock covering week highlights, what we’re thinking about the markets and what your clients may be asking this week.
Rising trade disputes and US-China strategic tensions are increasingly weighing on global risk assets. How are the frictions playing out on the ground in China?
In the last 10 years advances in technology have unexpectedly changed our lives in more ways than anyone could have imagined.
Elections for a new European Parliament in May and the formation of a new Commission by November will pave the way for fresh policy ideas. Ahead of this, we anticipate a wave of activity aimed at finalising some of the outstanding items on the current policy to-do list. Preparations for a post-Brexit financial system – already well underway – will continue to influence regulatory developments in Europe.
As the largest asset manager in the world, BlackRock has been one of the pioneers over the past decade in exploring the potential of big data, and in particular, alternative data sources, for generating alpha.
In a moment where investors have just begun to scratch the surface of big data and machine learning, the new and upcoming opportunities that can come from data science and its tools appear to be endless.
Over the past two years, 90% of all the data ever generated in history, has been created. The emergence of these hoards of big data, has led to a data ‘arms race’ in the investment world. With asset managers spending tens of millions of dollars each year on new forms of data, many processes within the industry have had to evolve.
The size of the datasets being created today is enormous, so new and sophisticated tools are necessary to analyse, measure and put this data to work. The world generates some 2.5 quintillion bytes of data every day, with IBM estimating that about 90% of the data available in the world today has been created over the past two years [1].
A decade ago the impact of passive investing was just beginning to be felt. It is now an unavoidable component of investors’ toolkits. Echoing passive’s exceptional growth, many experts now believe a new trend is emerging, known as core investing.
We identify three new market themes and update our asset views for 2019. We see growth in the global economy and corporate earnings slowing, and expect the Federal Reserve to become more data dependent in increasing rates. For investors, greater uncertainty calls for balancing risk and reward.
Big data is not a new phenomenon but the way many industries are using it is revolutionary and constantly changing. Data science experts sit down to uncover how big data is evolving and how it is impacting our lives and the decisions investors are making every day.
Fixed income markets are being disrupted by regulation, technology and shifting liquidity. An emerging understanding of what constitutes alpha, beta, factors, and their relationship with each other in the equity markets has opened fixed income investors’ eyes to new approaches to building investment solutions.
Foreign investors hold surprisingly few Chinese equities given the fact that it is the second biggest stock market and third biggest bond market globally. Read on to find out why the perceived realities are often far from the truth.