Its Not Harry

Comment and opinion for retail investors in the UK

Sustainability/ESG

Watching Brief – June 2023

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Pottering About

No result yet in the market tug of war

The market moves up and down at the moment as it reacts to conflicting data

As I started to write this month, at least one potential crisis had passed with an outcome that markets will find acceptable.  The US politicians have reached an agreement (subject to Congressional approval) on funding the US public debt for a full 2 years more.

Bad news is the fact that the war in Ukraine is building up to a critical point and we cannot know what the consequences will be.  Plus, a welter of news from China suggests that it has economic problems on a scale not anticipated and which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) may have trouble managing.

The push me/pull you trading in markets that we have seen this year is further sustained by the news that recessions might be avoided in some developed markets (good) but that means interest rates will stay higher for longer (bad).

For once there is some genuinely good news about a major business, which will be owned by many funds popular with readers, doing exceptionally.  This is Nvidia, the tech company set to benefit hugely from the rush to invest in AI.  It is looking like another Tesla for the moment, which means it will likely end in tears, but we can hope our fund managers will ride the bandwagon and book some profits.

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Watching Brief – March 2023

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Pottering About

A whole range of recent and maybe curious news items have seemed to me relevant to the short term direction of markets and maybe give us some hints, or at least warning signals, on the likely longer term trend.  Here are three for you to ponder.

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Midweek Musings (late!) – using equity income funds in a downturn

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I try to never be late, but at times a delay is not so important!

I have written a couple of pieces to introduce this subject and I had promised to comment on some specific funds last week.

However, I thought that the possibility that there was a ‘bottom’ in the market at that time (an idea that is still holding good, but it is early days yet) was a more urgent idea for your attention a week ago, so the global dividend/equity income fund examples got deferred.

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Watching Brief – April 2022

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Pottering About

I note that in previous years I have adopted a ‘first quarter end’ review approach in writing April briefings.  That still makes sense to me – we are now far enough into the year to get a feel for what will make 2022 different in economic terms and we can get an idea of what central banks are likely to do to try and manage economic growth and avoid a recession.

How good was my crystal ball?

I did some crystal ball gazing in January and identified a number of risks. Of the potential negatives, inflation and increasing geo-political tensions have turned out to be the two most significant headwinds, although increased US regulation is now coming through and we have not seen the back of Covid19 yet, especially in the Asia Pacific region.

One factor that I touted as a momentum positive, ESG investing, looks like being a little less of a useful guide short term than I predicted.  As the war in Ukraine and the associated sanctions on Russian energy have pushed the oil price up, so have the price of energy company shares, which will not fit in the portfolios of investors whose ESG filters are focused on sustainable energy and fossil fuel free energy production. This is a subject I address in the second part of this blog.

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Watching Brief – February 2022

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Pottering About

Many elements of global stock markets are in genuine ‘correction’ territory (usually a definition of a 10% or greater set back from the last peak).  Is that something we should worry about and do we need to take any immediate actions to re-organise our portfolios?

Spoiler alert, as they say, – no.

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