Global ETF News Older than One Year
DECPG Global Monthly-July 2017
July 25, 2017--Monthly Highlights
High-frequency data continue to suggest an ongoing recovery in global activity.
Global inflation has abated, reflecting subdued energy prices and low core inflation in major economies.
Following a rebound in 16Q4 and 17Q1, global trade momentum continued in 17Q2.
Capital inflows to EMDEs slowed in July, partly reflecting a rise in global bond yields.
Oil prices are fluctuating around $45/bbl, with global oil stocks close to record highs.
Special Focus: Arm's-Length Trade: A Source of Post-Crisis Trade Weakness
U.S. trade data highlight that arm's-length trade-trade between unaffiliated firms-accounts disproportionately for the post-crisis trade slowdown.
Compared to intra-firm trade, arm's-length trade depends more heavily on emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs), where output growth has slowed sharply, and on sectors that have languished after the crisis.
Constrained access to finance, heightened policy uncertainty, and firm-level characteristics also played a role.
Source: World Bank
IMF Working paper-Central Bank Balance Sheet Policies and Spillovers to Emerging Markets
July 25, 2017--Summary:
We develop a theoretical model that shows that in the near future, the monetary policies of some key central banks in advanced economies (AEs) will have two dimensions-changes in short-term policy rates and balance sheet adjustments.
This will affect emerging market economies (EMs), especially those with a pegged exchange rate, as these EMs primarily use a single monetary policy tool, i.e., the short-term policy rate. We show that changes in policy rates and balance sheet adjustments in AEs may differ in their respective financial spillovers to pegged EMs. Thus, it will be difficult for EMs to mitigate different types of spillovers with a single monetary policy tool. In that context, we use the model to show how EMs might use additional tools-capital controls and/or macro-prudential policy-to complement their monetary policy and financial stability toolkit. We also discuss how balance sheet adjustments that affect long-term interest rates may percolate to influence short-term interest rates via financial plumbing.
view the IMF Working paper-Central Bank Balance Sheet Policies and Spillovers to Emerging Markets
Source: IMF
ETF Securities Weekly Flows Analysis-Investors continue to rotate into cyclical asset
July 24, 2017--While investors pared back their defensive positions in gold and precious metal baskets, they built
positions in technology equities, industrial metals and commodity FX baskets
Inflows into robotic themed ETFs (US$7.2 mn) and cyber security themed ETFs (US$6.4 mn) were the highest in five and three weeks, respectively.
Industrial metals receive inflows for the fourth consecutive week
Technology- themed ETFs see multi-week high inflows. Both robotic and cybersecurity ETPs have seen stellar inflows since their inception.
Source: etfsecurities.com
IMF Working paper-Why Is Labor Receiving a Smaller Share of Global Income? Theory and Empirical Evidence
July 24, 2017--Summary:
This paper documents the downward trend in the labor share of global income since the early 1990s, as well as its heterogeneous evolution across countries, industries and worker skill groups, using a newly assembled dataset, and analyzes the drivers behind it.
Technological progress, along with varying exposure to routine occupations, explains about half the overall decline in advanced economies, with a larger negative impact on middle-skilled workers. In emerging markets, the labor share evolution is explained predominantly by global integration, particularly the expansion of global value chains that contributed to raising the overall capital intensity in production.
Source: IMF
Global sustainable investments grow 25% to $23 trillion
July 24, 2017--Global socially responsible investments grew by a quarter to $23 trillion over the last two years, with particularly strong gains in China, Japan and Australia and New Zealand.
While every region reported growth in socially responsible assets over the 24 months ending Dec. 31, 2015, the overall pace slowed from the 61 percent growth reported in the prior two-year period, according to a biennial survey by the Global Sustainable Investment Alliance.
Source: Bloomberg
IMF-World Economic Outlook Update, July 2017
July 23, 2017--The pickup in global growth anticipated in the April World Economic Outlook remains on track, with global output projected to grow by 3.5 percent in 2017 and 3.6 percent in 2018.
The unchanged global growth projections mask somewhat different contributions at the country level. U.S. growth projections are lower than in April, primarily reflecting the assumption that fiscal policy will be less expansionary going forward than previously anticipated. Growth has been revised up for Japan and especially the euro area, where positive surprises to activity in late 2016 and early 2017 point to solid momentum. China's growth projections have also been revised up, reflecting a strong first quarter of 2017 and expectations of continued fiscal support. Inflation in advanced economies remains subdued and generally below targets; it has also been declining in several emerging economies, such as Brazil, India, and Russia.
view the WORLD ECONOMIC OUTLOOK UPDATE JULY 2017 INFOGRAPHIC A Firming Recovery
view the IMF DataMapper: World Economic Outlook (April 2017)-Real GDP growth
Source: IMF
World Gold Council-Supply and demand data methodology note
July 21, 2017--The gold market is broad and complex, so producing statistics on demand and supply is challenging.
But having such statistics is crucial to understanding the fundamentals of the market. The World Gold Council overcomes the complexity to produce a robust, comprehensive and well-researched series of global gold demand and supply data. We publish these data and supporting commentary in our quarterly Gold Demand Trends report.
Source: World Gold Council (WGC)
DECPG Global Weekly-July 21, 2017
July 21, 2017--TAKING STOCK
U.S. jobless claims fell; import price declined
ECB kept policy unchanged; headline inflation softened in June
Bank of Japan left policy on hold, but lowered its inflation forecast
China's Q2 GDP growth exceeded market expectations
South Africa's central bank cut its interest rates for first time in five years
Source: World Bank
Chart: Fintech is in the Eye of the Beholder
July 21, 2017--The development of new technology in the financial sector is happening at a breakneck speed.
Between the emergence of the blockchain, AI, robo-advisors, regtech, payment and loan services, and many other examples of technological progress, there are many ideas to keep track of at once.
It would appear that these changes are happening so fast, in fact, that people don't even have a uniform idea of what fintech really is.
Source: visualcapitalist.com
Infographic-Banking the Unbanked is a $380B Opportunity
July 20, 2017--For those of us living in North America or Europe, we generally take the near-universal access we have to financial services for granted.
Sure, there are many people that have questions or concerns about the way central banks and currencies operate, but even the most skeptical of these people likely keep some money in a bank or investment account. It's convenient, easy, and it facilitates other economic transactions.
