March 10th, 2010
It is strange watching Hugh Hendry on Newsnight. He straddles two worlds the demonised hedge fund manager and the retail fund manager at times considered by IFAs to be part of their world. I’m not quite sure where I stand on it all.
Showing a Newsnight reporter around his West London office he is pretty impressive, turning up relaxed, considering, carefully, his positions, with much of his day, he said, involving reading books. Slow burn hedge fund management or something like that. He gets a million or two mandate into one of the long funds, loses out on a position - several are listed on a white board no less – defends his role over Greek debt and indeed his right to make a lot of money. The message from Hendry is don’t shoot the messanger.
I found it odd watching. Should I be a fan of Hendry representing the hedgies? I’m not sure. On one front he certainly complicates things for countries trying to cope with crises. There but for the ..read more
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March 8th, 2010
I have just finished reading a book about the Irish experience of the credit crunch. The title of Irish Times journalist – some might say polemicist – Fintan O’Toole’s book says it all. “Ship of fools. How stupidity and greed sank the Celtic Tiger.” I recommend it.
It is grim reading indeed for the Irish, but it might tell the British how it could have been worse. It might even cheer you up. Much of O’Toole’s case is against the Irish political class. Whether greed or deceit or stupidity, he outlines a country where the crisis did not just embroil the economy but politics too. The electorate didn’t help forgiving scandals mostly surrounding the ruling party, even returning convicted felons to the Irish parliament as part of a flawed localism from at least the 1980s on.
The Irish ruling party had an inappropriately close relationship with the property developers and the worst of the banks. The attitude to tax avoidance/evasion might kindly be described as tolerant.
We never had this. Our ..read more
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March 5th, 2010
I am never quite sure how much store to set by claims websites. The widely held industry view is that claims chasers or, gosh I’ve forgotten the term they prefer, oh yes, claims management firms, move from issue to issue seeking out the next rich seam of claims. I doubt they will ever hit pay dirt as they did with the endowment issue but what I find difficult to judge is how much traction they gain when they alight upon something new.
The latest site, I was pointed to this week, is www.missoldannuity.co.uk run from an office in central London. This site asks whether annuitants have been asked all the appropriate questions about the open market option though the emphasis is on whether people might have missed out on an enhancement. No mention, say, of drawdown. It does highlight an FSA pronouncement that 40 per cent of providers’ letters discussing retirement income did not give OMO enough prominence.
What I don’t know, ..read more
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Posted in Pensions | 1 Comment »
March 1st, 2010
I have always been a little wary of fund managers’ political pronouncements ever since I read a US investment bank’s assertion that George W. Bush’s reelection would be much better for global stability. Anyway that is a debate for another time.
As the polls point to a hung Parliament, fund managers’ warnings about what it might mean for markets should be heeded – but I would argue, only up to a point. Bad for equities they say, worse for bonds with the most outspoken critic Threadneedle, though many other houses have been muttering darkly too.
I have to question a few things however. First, the UK does not seem, at this moment in time, to want to hand an overall majority to one party. We have always had a funny sort of two and a half party system in England and three or three and a half in Scotland and Wales, since the 1970s anyway. David Cameron is not enthusing the centre ground probably as a result ..read more
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Posted in Regulation and Politics | 1 Comment »
March 3rd, 2010
You got to have some sympathy with IFAs in their relationships with insurance companies certainly the long standing ones. The small insurers tend to be overwhelmed or swallowed up, the bigger ones go off to try and be global champions with varying degrees of success.
Prudential is already a global player. It has had to field a lot of questions about its UK commitment from analysts and from IFAs over the last few years, with a lot of its operations in Asia already.
But before this proposed deal, it usually had answers for them.
Shareholders have had a lot to be happy about. But IFAs also. It has been a success story for the past five years and perhaps more – the protection pipeline problems aside. It didn’t get caught up in the worst of any of the bear markets, it has had a go0d product set, it has been very well placed to take investment business off the back of many successful asset allocation decisions on the main fund and ..read more
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lloyd bevan 
This is yet another despicable attempt to perpetuate the notion that a vast number of consumers have been short-changed.
Often these firms are operated by refugees from the financial services world – failures who couldn’t make it work and possibly failed the aptitude test to be a regulator.
Apathy is the greatest threat to financial well-being and until consumers exhibit greater commonsense and appetite for self reliance they will always suffer some financial penalty.
What next, mis-sold a deposit account? If your bank didn’t tell you that their internet account pays a higher rate you may have been mis-sold. Oh please.