With change accelerating in RI/ESG reporting standards, asset managers must proactively deliver transparency in their investment process and performance. Erika Toth, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, sets a baseline for those conversations with an inside look at the MSCI ESG Leaders Indexes.
Traditionally, private markets and other Alternative exposures have been limited to pension plans and institutional investors. However, shifting dynamics in public markets, elevated uncertainty and enhanced product design, have accelerated the democratization of Alts to a broader pool of accredited investors.
Market volatility has been stubbornly persistent — but does that present opportunity? Laura Tase, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, outlines how investors can capitalize on volatility — and enhance their income — with covered call option strategies
With interest rates rising and volatility persisting, Daniel Stanley, Director, Institutional & Advisory, examines the role of fixed income in asset allocation — and the tax benefits of discount bonds.
With bond markets still a challenge, Daniel Stanley, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs talks investors through executing active strategies using index exposures that can be dialed up — or down.
Seasonal spending habits exhibit a pattern which can be taken advantage of by implementing a simple rotational trading strategy. In this issue of VAULT, Mark Webster, Director, Institutional & Advisory and Vishal Bhatia, Director and Portfolio Manager show how it is possible to easily implement a disciplined seasonal sector rotational strategy which captures instinctive human behaviours in an investment thesis.
As runaway inflation erodes investors’ yield and portfolio returns, Laura Tase, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, outlines a defensive tool that can protect against rising rates and deliver valuable diversification — all within a single trade.
With the rising tide of easy money now in the past, many investors are looking for satellite exposures to re-position their portfolios for the late cycle — or even perhaps a recession. Erika Toth, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, offers a closer look at which sectors are best suited to the current environment, and the benefits of accessing them in a single trade.
With inflation running hot, investment counselors and family offices may want to re-assess their portfolio’s factor tilts. To this end, Erika Toth, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, offers insights into how factors perform across different interest rate regimes and market cycles.
As family offices and investment counsellors contend with a complex interest rate environment, Laura Tase, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, shares her thoughts on how you can complement traditional fixed income assets by including low correlation funds in your portfolios.
Fiduciaries have complex and often challenging considerations around Environmental, Social & Governance (ESG), Responsible Investing (RI) and investment mandates. To help ease the burden of due diligence, Mark Webster, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, explores index-based approaches to RI and ESG.
As family offices and investment counsellors grapple with changing economic and geopolitical factors, Daniel Stanley, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, shares his views on the need to look outside of traditional assets to satisfy your clients’ needs for a diversified, risk mitigated portfolio.
Interest in Alternative investments has raised considerably in the last few years. In this issue of THE VAULT, Mark Webster, Director, Institutional & Advisory, discusses how paltry yield from traditional safe haven bonds, and the spectre that those bonds may decline in price when interest rates rise, has driven investors to examine the diversification and yield benefits in Alternative investments.
As family offices and investment counsellors grapple with a changing world, Daniel Stanley, Director, Institutional & Advisory, BMO ETFs, shares his views on the need to look outside fixed income to satisfy your clients’ income requirements.
As credit spreads widen and central banks turn hawkish, we discuss four “plain vanilla” corporate bond ETFs to help reduce the impact of rising rates and inflation.
As the market fragmentation continues, we examine how factors are chosen and constructed, diving deep into the methodology of strategies that can replace or complement active mandates in your portfolio
One of the most respected truisms is that people and their organizations must adapt, or they will fall behind.
It’s crucial for investment counsellors and family offices to start integrating different fixed income solutions into their portfolios.
Views on the fiduciary responsibility to re-think your bond exposure, screen for ESG risks and overcome the obstacles to implementation.
Implementations that family offices and investment counselors can use to tap into the benefits of Factor-based ETFs
The seventeenth century laid the foundation for the modern world. Using observations and consistent methods, Sir Isaac Newton explained gravity and the earth’s rotation around the sun, establishing a new world view which remains unchallenged today. It is easy to take Newton’s achievements for granted, but he presented new ways to see the world and a cohesive framework to explain how things worked. Newton’s numeric proofs provided order, an important consideration at a time when questioning scripture caused chaos.
Given the state of our current economic climate, many high-net-worth clients looking for yield in their portfolios are finding this prospect difficult.
Exchange Traded Funds are effective market access tools, giving family offices greater control over several important elements in investing: currency exposure, taxation, investing costs, enhancing the portfolio construction and implementation process.
Many asset managers and investment council firms are well-versed in Canadian stock picking and build their brands through those picks. But these same firms are often challenged by the depth of research and expertise needed to reliably maximize returns on international investments.
Investing using factor tilts in a portfolio can be done either to manage risk or to generate alpha. Factor investing has been identified as one of the most significant advances in investment management in the last 20 years. Bridging the gap between Active management and Indexing, Factors incorporate the best of both worlds: low cost, consistent methodologies with the opportunity to outperform broad benchmark exposures.
After a tumultuous first quarter in fixed income markets, credit investors may understandably feel caught between a rock and a hard place. Government yields are historically low despite a sudden spike in corporate spreads, bond inventory continues to be challenged, and central banks are raising their inflation targets based on expectations the recent stimulus and vaccine rollouts will spur an economic recovery.
The traditional 60/40 asset mix was conceived in the 1980s when interest rates were higher and life expectancy was shorter. Current low interest rates, however, have changed portfolio construction assumptions for all investors. Today’s portfolios have reduced allocations to bonds and increased allocations to equities.
It’s no coincidence that ETFs and RI are growing together because ETFs are cost-efficient delivery vehicles for RI strategies with several advantages over active RI solutions, especially for the Family Offices and Investment Counselling firms, who face scalability challenges.