Gaining Perspective

Making sense of the complex global economic environment is essential for advisors, at least for the very important reason of being able to intelligently answer their clients’ questions. Today, the greatest uncertainties are in Fed policy, China and Brexit. We hear from Gene Tannuzzo, whose job it is to make sense of those issues for advisors and their clients.

A compelling feature that draws investors to ETFs is “thematic investing.” We’ll discuss how it allows investors to target companies that are poised to benefit from structural shifts in technology, people, demographics and infrastructure development.

Dividend growth strategies showed their worth during the most recent stock market turbulence. While the S&P 500® declined more than 8% in October and November last year, dividend growth strategies fared far better. And that wasn’t limited to the domestic large-cap stock universe. It applied to mid-cap and small-cap stocks as well. I talk to the person behind the products that benefitted the most from that outperformance.

Sue Thompson oversees the distribution of the SPY ETF, which now has over $250 billion in assets. She discussed what SSgA is doing to ensure the SPDR product line is priced competitively.

Robo advisors suffer from a common flaw, according to Zvi Bodie. They don’t use a “safety first” methodology and are exposing users to unnecessary risks.

According to research from Cerulli, nearly half of advisors use a model portfolio to manage $2.7 trillion in assets. We’ll discuss how those models are permeating all aspects of investment management in the financial advisory industry.

2018 may have been the toughest year for investors insofar as federal regulations are concerned. That goes back to when the SEC began reviewing conduct standards in 1995.  We’ll look at what changed in the fiduciary landscape in 2018 and the outlook for 2019.

The chief goal of society should be to maximize wealth, according to Tyler Cowen. Pursuing that goal has delivered everything from nutritious and abundant food to air conditioning and smartphones in the developed world, and those benefits are spreading rapidly to the developing world. We’ll look at whether Cowen’s single-minded focus on growth make sense and what it means for investors.

One of the most remarkable developments in the financial markets over the last 25 years is that the number of publicly traded companies has declined by half. We’ll look at the reasons for that decline and what it means for investors.