Investments

Debt trap

Last month, we looked at some of the perils of leveraging, using actual market data starting in years 1990 and 1973. Of course, plucking two years out of history can’t reveal the entire picture, so let’s look at a cost versus benefit calculation for all years since 1900, using a leveraging calculator based on market […]

March 30, 2009

5 min read

Tails of risk

By most accounts, the current financial crisis is epochal — the worst since the Depression. Still, it is a truism in asset management: look after the downside and the returns will look after themselves. But how well do asset managers look after the downside? In the current market meltdown, evidence of failure isn’t hard to […]

By Scot Blythe |March 27, 2009

3 min read

Private equity firms batten down the hatches

Canadian equities have proven no place to hide during the financial storm, and that applies to firms operating in private markets too: venture capital, mezzanine financing and leveraged buyouts. And that storm whips up winds in all directions. Fundraising has dwindled as traditional private equity investors find themselves overextended. The general partnerships that invest the […]

By Scot Blythe |March 23, 2009

4 min read

Economy is bad, but stock valuations aren’t: Report

The world is in a deep global recession that’s expected to continue until at least the end of this year, but that doesn’t mean the markets aren’t rife with opportunity, according to the latest Global Investment Outlook by the country’s largest asset manager, RBC Asset Management. According to RBC’s 70-page spring investment outlook, authored by […]

By Mark Noble |March 12, 2009

5 min read