Opinion

Financial stability as we have always known it is showing cracks. The climate in the financial markets is changing. Despite earlier assumptions, it turns out to be a definitive shift.

To thrive in a new climate, adaptability is needed. Market participants lacking this quality face the same fate as the dinosaurs. Dominant market players fail to realize that a major catastrophe is not necessary. After all, dinosaurs at the top of the food chain do not pay attention to their surroundings.

Costs of investment funds continue to be a divisive topic in the fund and asset management business. Are investors really paying 40% too much? Or ‘only’ 25%? What are they actually paying for? In Luxembourg, home to a third of Europe’s 30,000 Ucits funds, this discussion could lead to major changes in the coming years, like it already has in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands.

One of the elements that Bitcoin investors cite is the cryptocurrency’s performance when the stock market is doing poorly. These coins are then often described as a “flight-to-safety” investment: an asset that rises in value when the rest of the portfolio goes down. Is this really the case?

The latest edition of the Bank of America Global Fund Manager Survey shows that fund managers are still overweight equities while their expectations of future economic growth have come down considerably.

Indeed, the chart below shows that fund managers have never been so pessimistic about growth. Not during Covid and not during the Great Financial Crisis. The ‘mismatch’ between expectations and positioning is extreme.

In 1908, there were 16,000 Luxembourgish immigrants living in Chicago. They were extremely poor and needed to emigrate to survive. Today, people emigrate to Luxembourg for different reasons. It’s more about thriving rather than surviving.

Without immigration, there would be no fund industry, there is a constant need to attract talent from abroad. Amazingly, only 20% of the local population works in the private sector. Probably even less in the fund industry.

The CSSF has spent the last decade ramping up reporting requirements on fund management companies. In response, the fund industry has invested heavily in automation and now most reports are generated automatically. 

If only this was true! 

Once upon a time in 2013, Luxembourg launched the conversion of the EU directive on alternative investment fund managers (AIFMD) into its national law. It ultimately culminates, alongside the conversion of other European countries of the AIFMD, into the first globally regulated environment for alternative investment funds (AIFs).

A recession is what usually concerns many investors, and economists. But exactly how they estimate the probability of a recession is often unclear to me. And sometimes not much of the “approach” is correct either. Given the significant potential impact on different asset classes, it makes sense to attempt to get a grip on it myself.

It is striking how bad economists are at predicting a recession. They have shouted so many times now that a recession is coming, that they have just dug in and knowingly stuck to this tunnel vision.

The implementation of the AIFMD, the European directive for alternative investment funds managers, in 2011 can be seen as the starting point for the transition to a greater degree of specialisation. The requirements in this directive have increased the cost of obtaining an AIFM licence to a point such that a licence often no longer is viable for smaller fund boutiques. As a result, the use of ManCos has become even more popular for tangible assets such as real estate.