Covid-19

Net sales of investment funds in Europe were at their lowest in November - apart from bonds - as investors worried about the new Covid-19 Omicron variant while awaiting reactions by the world’s central banks to rising inflation, the European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA) said on Monday.

So goes January, so goes the year, it is sometimes said. If so, Mr Market has decided that the Covid-19 pandemic is behind us. This has investment implications: the long duration narrative will fade into the background, and “real economy” stocks will outperform again.

The conglomerate of conglomerates, Berkshire Hathaway, has been staging a strong rally in recent weeks. Warren Buffett’s vehicle has risen sharply on the back of its substantial position in Apple, which recently passed the $3 trillion mark. But there is more to it.

Despite much debate in the market about the hows and whys of ESG integration, impact investing is steadily making its way into the financial mainstream. In 2021, the first year in two decades in which extreme poverty once again rose, with lasting consequences for the world’s most vulnerable people in particular, the financial industry once again demonstrated the importance of real, tangible impact.

The European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA) has today published its latest monthly Investment Fund Industry Fact Sheet, providing data on net sales of UCITS and AIFs sold in June 2021, at a European level and by fund domicile.