All articles by Joseph Mariathasan – Page 3
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Analysis
London’s Lord Mayor Nicholas Lyons outlines his plan to raise £50bn from pension funds for UK growth assets
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. This aphorism can perhaps well describe the current state of the UK’s investment ecosystem. Despite Europe’s largest pension market at £2.5trn (€2.9trn), the UK economy has been starved of risk capital through a series of legislative and regulatory decisions.
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Features
Pancakes for lunch with Nobel laureate Harry Markowitz
Harry Markowitz, Nobel Laureate and founder of Modern Portfolio Theory, passed away in June this year. Much has been written about his contribution to the development of modern finance theory. Less, though, on Harry as a person.
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Features
Digital health revolution ramps up
The world is at the beginning of a digital health revolution. This has been accelerated by the COVID pandemic that forced radical shifts in doctor/patient interactions, and supercharged by the emergence of OpenAI’s ChatGPT that brought generative artificial intelligence (AI) to the forefront and pulled the potential of AI in healthcare into the limelight.
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Features
UK venture capital: spinning out for success
Academic research produces excellent technology and medical firms, but the funding is not always available to take things further
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Asset Class Reports
Fixed income & credit – Sustainability-linked bonds
Sovereigns and other issuers are yet to embrace sustainability-linked bonds but issuance is growing
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Asset Class Reports
Equities – Does location matter in the corporate listings debate?
The number of listed companies have fallen dramatically, but London remains a preferred global financial centre
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Features
BlackRock executive pegs inequality with new opportunity index
“Inequality is both a risk and an opportunity that should be measured,” says Gavin Lewis in a conversation about his book ‘The Opportunity Index: A solution-based framework to dismantle the racial wealth gap’. Growing up in a single parent household without a father in Tottenham, a predominantly black area of London with high poverty levels, Lewis is well qualified to have a view on inequality. But as a managing director at BlackRock, is he also an example of the exception that proves the rule?
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Features
Tackling the sustainability conundrum
With climate change and the loss of biodiversity seen as potential existential risks for humanity, it has become imperative to create and implement a sustainable form of capitalism
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Asset Class Reports
Fixed income – Europe's investment-grade market makes a comeback
Investors are showing tentative signs of interest as spreads tighten
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Country Report
UK: Can the country turn a flawed investment ecosytem around?
Decades of complex legislation has fuelled many unanticipated consequences, which has seen pension funds invest less in riskier listed equities and illiquid assets
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Asset Class Reports
Emerging market equities – Rise of the Gulf equity markets
The Gulf region is changing dramatically and provides growing opportunities for emerging market investors
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Asset Class Reports
Emerging market equities – India’s dancing elephant in the room
Despite challenges with corporate governance and corruption, the prospects for India are too bright to ignore for investors
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Features
The West should understand the strengths and limitations of Enterprise China
China is fast becoming the West’s bogeyman. Yet a hard decoupling of the two would be a lose-lose situation for both. Despite the tensions, private companies face the challenge of creating viable strategies for interactions with China that could make the difference between success and bankruptcy.
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Features
Central banks and the weaponisation of finance
The US has been a global power since the second world war. But it was during the interval between the collapse of the USSR in 1991 and the rise of China in the 21st century that the US was perhaps the single global hegemon.
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Asset Class Reports
Private debt: Leases make plane sense after COVID
With plenty of pent-up demand for air travel, aeroplane operating leases may be an attractive investment option
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Asset Class Reports
Equities – Thematic funds tap into future trends
Themes have long captured the imagination of retail investors. Now institutions are showing interest, despite the lack of clear definitions
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Features
Fresh views on emerging markets
Despite a large, heterogeneous universe of opportunities across countries that have little or no commonality, risk contagion in the emerging market universe is still an issue, highlighted most dramatically by the 1997 Asian crisis and the risk on/risk off capital movements after the 2007-08 global financial crisis.
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Asset Class Reports
Fixed income: Paradigm shift for investors
Credit is looking more attractive on a risk/reward basis for new investment, but the factors that led to the 2022 volatility have not disappeared
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Features
Climate risks – pay now or later?
Climate change is an emergency that requires all hands on deck. What should be the role of investors when it is governments that have the most power to effect change?
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Asset Class Reports
Equities – Investing in the midst of Europe’s gloom
Healthcare and luxury brands are two sectors with potential to stand out in an otherwise gloomy macro environment