elstonviews

Private clients and families wanting wealth advice, typically want holistic wealth advice. That's why it's worth remembering that investment capital is only one form of capital. Client fact finding should go well beyond understanding an investment portfolio, to account for other forms of capital - what it is and how it's structured. What are the other key forms of client capital to consider: Land: the oldest capital of all, since "they just don't make it anymore" - how is it held, how is it managed. In the UK agricultural yields nose-dived when the US prairies got going and crisis-related spikes aside, have never fully recovered. But "green gold" remains a resilient, and tax-efficient, store of value, and a source of collateral where productive. Property: principal, residential, and commercial property all require attention and management. Providing a store of value, an income yield and a source of collateral, it's no wonder that br...

UK commentators are looking for data points that vindicate the Referendum result one way or the other Sterling’s slide and the FTSE 100 Index level together or in isolation are not the best indicators for a Brexit fear gauge The potential inflationary impact of a ‘hard Brexit’ has caused UK breakeven rates to spike, creating a real challenge for the Bank of England Give me a sign Just as high priests in Roman times, after slaughtering their offering, examined its entrails to gauge the Gods’ favour,  so too have UK commentators been searching for any statistical insight or market data point to declare whether the shock Brexit result is likely to lead to economic success or failure. The data point phoney war The data that has come out since the EU Referendum on 23 rd June 2016 is meaningless as we still don’t know what Brexit looks like.  It’s been a phoney war for headlines, as stunned commentators search for a gauge to measure policymakers by. ...

BlackRock announced today that is cutting its fees on its iShares Core (US) range.  Investors can gain broad market exposures for 4-14bp.  This compares to 7-25bp for the iShares Core (UK) range. A diversified multi-asset 70/30 ETF portfolio will cost US investors can 8bp (that’s 8 cents per $100), compared to 14bp for a similar strategy for UK investors. Might the UK follow suit? We’ll see. Big dreams The cuddly  caption announcing the move says “Smaller Fees means Bigger Dreams”, which is warm-hearted.  But it’s also sort of fair.  Today’s retail investor has more access to breadth and depth of international markets than our parents ever dreamed of (if they ever dreamed of that sort of thing). What does this mean, apart from being cheaper? Well firstly, Moore’s law applies to ETF pricing & capacity as much as it does to semiconductors.  That’s not  new or surprising.  But the sustained deflationary pressure on fund fees is ...