Investment Officer Belgium

Imagine this: your boss can see exactly when you’re sitting at your desk, what time you arrive, what time you leave, and when you take lunch. It almost sounds like a nightmare from a dystopian novel, but for 300 equity analysts, this was daily reality between 2017 and 2021.

Corporate governance is one of those topics investors prefer to push into the background as long as markets are rising. Yet the quality of corporate governance is one of the most decisive factors for the long-term valuation of an equity market.

While private banks and asset managers are heavily investing in AI for their own processes, something is also changing on the other side of the table: A client who shows up with six pages of AI-generated advice. “It is now essential for managers and banks to make their advisors highly AI-savvy.”

A group of Belgian investors returned to Omaha, Nebraska, this weekend for Berkshire Hathaway’s annual meeting, but for the first time Warren Buffett was not on stage. The 95-year-old still attended, yet the tone of the “Woodstock of capitalism” has begun to shift.

Every May, a ritual unfolds in Omaha, Nebraska that I have never quite understood. Thousands of investors fly to a shareholder meeting in the middle of the American Midwest to hear a wise old man explain that smart investors can probably find better uses for their money than flying to shareholder meetings in the middle of the American Midwest.

Active asset allocation is a double-edged sword. Executed well, tactical shifts can generate alpha and differentiate from the benchmark. The trade-off is greater complexity, with more moving parts and higher demands on skill and discipline. Investors should also assess the costs of tactical allocation.

The Iran war has broken the trend toward greater convergence between yields on European government bonds. Yields rose particularly sharply in Italy and the United Kingdom, while countries such as the Netherlands and Spain managed to limit the damage somewhat.

Oil prices will have to climb much higher to stabilise global markets as disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz deepen, JPMorgan said. For import-dependent Europe, the risk of slower growth and higher inflation is rising by the day.

Every time an oil crisis occurs, the recession scenario is immediately dusted off. The oil price rises, analysts pull out their charts, and within a week the first warnings appear that a recession is inevitable. But the relationship between oil crises and recessions is much weaker than is commonly assumed.