News Mentions & Press Releases
Deep value looks attractive, and Guggenheim’s S&P 500 Pure Value (RPV | A-61) is a top pick in the space.
The positive outlook toward deep value can be broken down into two recommendations. First, value stocks are poised to end the long period of growth outperforming value. Second, within value, deep value stocks rank as the most attractive.
With U.S. stocks near record highs and memories of last summer’s volatility still in mind, investors could be forgiven for wondering whether this is the year to “sell in May and go away.”
Stocks have shaken off an early-year rout, but a reading of first-quarter growth for the U.S. economy came in below expectations last week and corporate earnings have been lackluster, clouding the long-term outlook for stocks.
After falling 11% in about the first six weeks of the year, stocks have bounced back, but now at a slower pace. In the six weeks following a Feb. 11 trough, the S&P 500 climbed 11%. In the roughly five weeks after that, it rose 1.4%. Both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 are off about 3% from their highs set in May of last year.
A flurry of opinions has engulfed the industry ever since the Department of Labor began its pursuit of a fiduciary rule six years ago. After Labor Secretary Tom Perez and a host of other officials unveiled details of the rule on Wednesday, advisors and industry experts are absorbing the details and dissecting what it will mean for their companies and/or their practices.
But how do advisors really feel? Read on to see their reactions, or click here for a slideshow version.
The advantages offered by the exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in combination with the innovation applied by its issuers in the products offered has attracted more and more investors and traders to become a part of the global exchange traded funds industry. The market for ETFs has grown substantially over the years with the biggest asset management companies now a part of it. We take a look at some of the trends characterizing the current ETF market.(For related reading, see:The Benefits Of ETF Investing.)
InvestmentNews has released the first video in their Fiduciary Focus series. The series will center around the new DOL fiduciary rule announced April 6. CLS’s Chief Executive Officer, Todd Clarke, will be featured throughout the series, alongside other industry leaders. Watch the first video, “The Winners and Losers of the DOL Fiduciary Rule: Advice industry experts weigh in on who stands to gain from the Labor Department’s final fiduciary rule, as well as the areas of the industry due to suffer under the new regulation.”
After nearly six years of waiting, the broker-dealer industry is getting its first glance of the finalized fiduciary rule, released officially Wednesday by the Department of Labor.
Labor Secretary Thomas Perez, who spoke with reporters Tuesday, says the department has “streamlined” and clarified its conflict of interest rule — including the controversial Best Interest Contract Exemption (BICE).
Plus, the DOL has pushed out the initial compliance timeline for the fiduciary rule to one year from the original eight months and “phased in the implementation [of the entire BICE requirements] so firms will have until Jan. 1, 2018” to be fully compliant.
As the sun sets on the first quarter of 2016, dovish remarks from officials at the Federal Reserve have buoyed market sentiment, but many investment strategists are expressing a more cautious brand of optimism.
Perhaps the most optimistic commentary comes from Brett Wander, Charles Schwab Investment Management’s CIO of fixed income, who believes that positive job growth, stable numbers in housing and manufacturing and signs of only mild inflation point to a better 2016 than many strategists have anticipated moving into the second quarter.
“I think that the degree of pessimism that we’re seeing in the marketplace isn’t really applicable to the U.S.,” Wander says. “We’re moving in a positive direction. Pessimism is more appropriate in Europe and Japan.”
At BlackRock, Heidi Richardson, head of investment strategy for U.S. iShares, and Tushar Yadava, investment strategist, have written that recent comments by Fed Chair Janet Yellen at the Economic Club of New York provided a boost in equities, commodities and emerging market currencies. But the two strategists cast wary eyes at future rate hikes and a rising dollar.
On the prowl for new avenues for growth, private equity firms are ramping up their pursuit of the RIA market.
Mercer Advisor’s acquisition of Kanaly Trust, involving not one but two powerhouse private equity firms, is the most recent example of the increasing influence of PE firms in the advisory space.
Last year, Lovell Minnick Partners sold Mercer to fellow PE firm Genstar Capital. This week, Lovell Minnick sold Kanaly to Mercer and will retain a stake in the bulked up $8 billion-plus firm, now an industry leader with national aspirations.
Investment banking firm Advice Dynamics Partners is getting “an unprecedented number of inquiries from PE firms seeking to invest in the wealth management space,” says CEO David Selig. “Between Park Sutton, our strategic alliance partner, and Advice Dynamics Partners, we jointly receive multiple calls per week.”
The weekend of March 5 was unkind to the ETF industry, from a media standpoint. A gold ETF from iShares temporarily stopped creating new shares until additional shares could be registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The ETF was the iShares Gold Trust (IAU).
Headlines varied, but all had the same message. The Wall Street Journal called it a “snafu,” writing:
“It was the latest bruise for the $2 trillion exchange-traded-fund business in the U.S., which has boomed in recent years, attracting investors with low fees and access to asset classes from foreign stocks to commodities.”
Barron’s categorized the event as a “hiccup,” while Investor’s Business Daily identified it as merely a “bump.” No matter the phrasing, nobody reading the news that day would have missed it.
Commodities were a gusher in the past month, with a dozen ETFs investing in oil and gasoline futures pumping out double-digit gains. Gold built on its turnaround in 2016, and silver wasn’t too far behind.
United States Oil (USO) was a best-performing ETF as it soared 26% in the month ended March 10. It marked an astonishing comeback for an exchange traded product that’s averaged a 33% annual loss over the past three years.
Equity investors, too, rode the oil patch and gold rush to stellar gains. Infracap MLP (AMZA) vaulted 28%, and Market Vectors Junior Gold Miners (GDXJ) 27%.