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21 October 2024

Rate cuts and the ‘Trump trade’

Market updates
Last week, the European Central Bank (ECB) cut interest rates by 25 basis points (bps) as inflation fell below the 2% target in September and growth remains sluggish. While not pre-committing to more cuts, ECB President Lagarde’s communication hinted that more could be on the way, given growth worries.
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Giving credit where it’s due
15 October 2024

Giving credit where it’s due

Market Insights
The past few weeks have been quite volatile. First, tensions in the Middle East continued to grab the headlines, pushing oil prices higher. Second, US job growth, services activity and inflation came in higher than expected, leading to markets expecting smaller, more gradual US Federal Reserve (Fed) rate cuts.
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07 October 2024

How we’re positioning for volatility bouts

Market updates
After three weeks of positive performance, the key equity indices ended flat to marginally higher in the US and fell in Europe last week for two reasons: First, escalating Middle East tensions sent the price of risky assets lower while pushing oil prices higher. Second, better-than-expected jobs and services data out of the US led markets to no longer expect a big rate cut in November.
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02 October 2024

The Middle East and the markets (the sequel)

Market updates
The escalation in the Middle East took a new turn yesterday as Iran fired a barrage of ballistic missiles at Israel in retaliation for the start of ground operations in Lebanon. At the time of writing, it’s too early to tell whether the conflict could broaden to the wider region and/or involve the US – where things are further complicated by the presidential election in November.
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30 September 2024

Policymakers chase the clouds away

Market updates
Last week, China unveiled a surprise package of stimulus measures to boost its economy and stock market. The People’s Bank of China (PBoC) cut interest rates, lowered banks’ reserve requirement ratios and relaxed mortgage policies.
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23 September 2024

Markets welcome the Fed’s jumbo interest rate cut

Market updates
Last week, the US Federal Reserve (Fed) decided to cut interest rates by half a percentage point, or 50 basis points (bps), bringing the Fed funds rate in the 4.75-5.00% range. Typically, central banks tend to move in increment of 25 bps.
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Quintet sets its sights on Finland
19 September 2024

Quintet sets its sights on Finland

Luxembourg-headquartered private bank recruits team of five experienced Finnish wealth management professionals and launches Finnish Desk
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16 September 2024

The time has come (to cut US rates)

Market updates
The weekend saw another attempted shooting of Donald Trump. While any market implication remains unclear at the time of writing, along with whether and to what extent this might shift voter intentions, this could put the US election on 5 November on investors’ radars even more.
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Navigating market volatility
09 September 2024

Navigating market volatility

Market Insights
The adage “sell in May and go away”, referring to the historically weaker performance of stocks from May to October compared with the other half of the year, didn’t disappoint this time around, too.
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02 September 2024

Investor focus shifts from inflation to jobs

Market updates
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been one the biggest market stories over the past couple of years. At the centre of it all is Nvidia, the California-based company that up until a few years ago was mostly known for its graphic cards used in the video game industry.
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26 August 2024

Interest rate cutting cycle gathers momentum

Market updates
With the weak US employment report for July still in mind, investors were anxiously awaiting Federal Reserve (Fed) Chair Powell’s speech at the Jackson Hole Economic Symposium last week. It was his first address to the public since the Fed meeting in late July. Since then, a lot has happened.
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Travel Light
21 August 2024

Travel Light

ESG
While it's the excitement of exploring new places that drives us, we should be mindful of the environment we're travelling to. After all, as visitors, we bring with us a carbon footprint that can affect the local community.
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19 August 2024

Equity markets recover further

Market updates
After a tough start to August, equity markets around the globe performed positively, celebrating better-than-expected data out of the US (see below). In the US, the tech-heavy NASDAQ Composite index, rose more than the S&P 500, after underperforming in recent weeks in the context of a mixed earnings season.
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12 August 2024

Risk appetite recovers

Market updates
In the absence of major economic releases last week, markets took a breather after a sharp fall on Monday, almost paring losses on Friday. The sell-off was due to a trifecta of dynamics triggered the previous week.
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05 August 2024

How we navigate volatile markets

Market updates
After another week with some volatile trading sessions, the S&P 500 equity index closed about 2% lower. US Treasuries rallied, with the 10-year yield falling to well below 4% (and, therefore, bond prices rising, as they move inversely to yields) as markets priced in more interest rate cuts by the US Federal Reserve (Fed). That made the US dollar decline against major, currencies, and the gold price move higher.
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Why should investors consider adding private markets to their portfolios?
01 August 2024

Why should investors consider adding private markets to their portfolios?

Invest differently
Private markets were once the reserve of sophisticated and institutional investors but have experienced significant growth in recent years. Now, a far broader range of private market investments are available to clients.
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29 July 2024

Economic data and interest rate cuts are supportive, but Big Tech earnings fail to impress

Market updates
Last week, investors were faced with both disappointing earnings news and encouraging macro data, resulting in a few volatile sessions for stock markets. Mid-week, the S&P 500 had its worst decline since 2022. However, thanks to favourable US economic growth and inflation data, markets were able to recoup part of the losses at the end of the week.
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23 July 2024

A (not so surprising) twist in the US election

Market updates
As suspected by the market for some time, Joe Biden has decided to pull out of the US presidential race, endorsing his Vice President, Kamala Harris. While Harris polls better than Biden, she still lags Donald Trump. Even though there don’t seem to be any obvious challengers within the party, the Democrats can still choose other candidates.
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15 July 2024

A busy summer as the US election nears

Market updates
Last week, US Treasury yields fell as US inflation came in lower than markets expected. Global bond yields and the US dollar also fell as markets firmed up their view that the US Federal Reserve (Fed) will cut interest rates in September and December.
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Europe revisited
08 July 2024

Europe revisited

Market Insights
A bit like the unpredictable weather we’ve had over the past few weeks, politics has been a rollercoaster. As expected, the UK election delivered a Labour win. While there might be tax and broader fiscal implications at the individual level, the outcome wasn’t unexpected, which is why it hasn’t moved markets that much.
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