All Global articles – Page 127
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White papersThe Great Instability: Five lessons from COVID-19
The Great Instability: this is the label we chose last year to describe the fragile nature of the global economy and wider society, looking at 2020. It’s a label inspired by the contrast with a very different period known as the Great Stability – a dim but not so distant past, in the years leading up to the Great Financial Crisis, when it appeared as if the economy had achieved its state of ‘nirvana’. A global pandemic was not exactly front of mind when we settled on ‘The Great Instability’; still, it fits quite neatly into the overarching concept. After all, the world was already, and will remain, a volatile place.
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White papers5G Dis-Connectivity
Geopolitical and trade tensions may fragment the 5G supply chain, but while that could make the theme more complex to navigate, it is unlikely to diminish its importance.
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White papersMarket Commentary – Financial repression and the sovereign carry trade
Chinese data on Monday may vindicate hopes of a V-shape recovery. Yet we warn against extrapolating 1/ an early bounce driven by pent-up demand and 2/ Chinese trends to the broader economy. The ‘swoosh’ scenario for the global economy remains very credible.
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White papersReal estate outlook – Out of office
The COVID-19 outbreak has forced a revolution in office working in the past 10 weeks, with millions of employees working successfully from home across the world. This has led to competing claims about whether working from home will revolutionise the future organisation of work and change the nature of the office real estate business.
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White papersBeyond the box-ticking: what really makes a board function well?
At the end of April, EOS at Federated Hermes published a white paper ‘Guiding Principles for an Effective Board – Insights from Engagement’. These five principles focus on the human, relational and behavioural aspects of boards, rather than the usual standardised data sets, which don’t tell the full story.
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White papersQuarterly Economic Outlook: we’ve never had it so loose
The US and UK are already running highly negative interest rates, when QE is considered, according to a report by the International business of Federated Hermes. It says that true, QE-adjusted policy rates are now as low as -10% in the US, and -6% in the UK or around -12% and -8% in real (inflation-adjusted) terms.
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White papersCrisis and resilience – Navigating a sustainable recovery
When we emerge from the pandemic, an important issue will be whether the collaboration and focus can be maintained and harnessed to address the climate crisis or other global issues.
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White papersNo Liftoff on the Horizon
The Fed Funds rate is set to remain at its zero-lower bound for several years, while the BOE and BOJ assess current policy next week, and more trade deals appear on the horizon.
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White papersWeekly investment update – 10 June 2020
Hot spots in Latin America, India and the Middle East / Brazil charts its own course / will the US see a second wave / caution: US jobs data / more stimulus from the ECB and a German package
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White papersDoes the coronavirus mean the end of the fast fashion trend?
With high street fashion stores closed due to the global pandemic and unsold stock piling up in warehouses, “fast fashion” is under pressure as never before. Does lockdown offer a chance to rethink this unsustainable business model, which has high environmental and social costs?
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White papersDealing with our plastics waste
We have a plastic problem. On a trip to visit my family in South Africa at Christmas, what struck me was that even on the most remote and protected marine coastline my children and I managed to fill bags with plastic straws and other plastic debris. And the stats confirm we have a problem. Currently, only 14% of our annual plastic packaging produced is recycled, while only 2% is reused for the same or similar products. Instead, most of our plastic waste ends up in landfill or is leaked into our environment (around 12 million tonnes of plastic enter the oceans globally every year).
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White papersThe EM Default Picture: More Nuanced Than Headlines Imply
The coronavirus pandemic is creating short-term and long-term challenges for emerging markets (EMs). But not all sovereign and corporate issuers can be painted with the same broad brush, and placing too much weight on overly dire forecasts may result in missed opportunities.
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White papersPrivate Equity’s Return Persistence Through Downturns
Although downturns are all uniquely challenging, there are historical patterns to consider as we try to understand the likely impact of COVID-19 on our existing private equity portfolio.
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White papersA Very Bond-Friendly Crisis
We believe the COVID-19 crisis and the response from governments and central banks creates an unusually favorable macro environment for credit.
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White papersWorld Environment Day – The importance of and concerns over biodiversity
The United Nations’ World Environment Day on 5 June focuses on biodiversity and the concern about its integrity and its importance for global communities and life on Earth generally as well as markets and economies.
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Asset Manager NewsFederated Hermes marks World Environment Day
Over the past year, there has been a notable shift in awareness of two environmental challenges: the burgeoning climate emergency, and our troubled relationship with nature and biodiversity. The wide-reaching impact of the coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the urgent need to prepare and protect against future global threats, and it is imperative that policymakers, companies and individuals take heed and come together to tackle both the climate crisis and our exploitation of the critical ecosystem ‘services’ we rely so heavily on.
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White papersWeekly investment update – 3 June 2020
Easing the curbs in Europe; hotspot now Latin America / South Korea: an uptick in cases after lockdown / Europe’s answer to the blow / expect more stimulus and central bank pump priming
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White papersMulti Asset: a solid total portfolio approach for a complex world
An increasing number of institutional investors have adopted a total portfolio approach (TPA) as a response to the weaknesses of more traditional strategic asset allocation (SAA)-based methodologies. We believe the current crisis will reinforce this trend, as it is probably marking a paradigm shift in financial markets. This shift could be as important as the change in US monetary policy brought in by Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker at the beginning of the 1980s, which led to a long period of disinflation, lower interest rates and high asset returns.
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White papersThe day after #5 - New Frontiers for Central Banks
Central Banks (CBs) are by nature more flexible than governments. Thus, they have been the most proactive in this crisis, reintroducing large-scale asset-purchase programmes financed by money creation (QE policies). With this pandemic, a spectacular change in economic policy has taken place in just a few months: fiscal and monetary policies have become intertwined, and this is probably not reversible. While governments have become the buyers of last resort, CBs are playing their role as lenders of last resort. How far can they go? We argue here that CBs are still far from being out of ammunition. Financial repression and fiscal dominance are here to stay. CBs will maintain low bond yields for an extended period of time to alleviate the burden on the most leveraged agents.
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White papers“The World’s Factory” Reopens
Just as Chinese manufacturers are coming back online, the rest of the global economy is still struggling to contain the outbreak. With overseas demand for Chinese manufactured goods weakening, where does demand come from? How might this affect China’s economy?
