Money Matters – Teaching Kids about money
May 28th, 2009
Archive
Archive for May, 2009
Face to Face with the Minga Team
May 25th, 2009
In Chapter Five of the book, How Much Is Enough?, we featured Katie Simon and her family. One of the greatest pleasures of this trip was the opportunity it gave me to come face to face with this extraordinary group of teenagers. Every Sunday evening, the Minga leaders get together to discuss new strategies to fight the problem of child trafficking and prostitution. This is without doubt one of the most confronting issues of our time. The facts are staggering. Over three hundred thousand kids in the US are in danger of sexual abuse at any one time. The average age of entry into prostitution is 13 years. The reality is almost too shocking to address. But this group of teenagers are constantly coming up with new ways to make sure it is a problem in everyone’s consciousness and in particular their peers. We have all wondered at one stage or another about the language of teenagers today. My biggest stumbling block was over the use of the word random – at least it was until Katie told me that the new word of choice for American teenagers is pimpin. It’s not cool anymore, it’s pimpin! But this is a word that strikes at the very core of Minga’s philosophy. They are convinced that if teenagers actually knew the real stories behind the word pimp, there is no way they would use it in this fashion. And so a new strategy was born. To Minga it is about knowledge and education. If teenagers can be made change their everyday language through an awareness campaign, public opinion can be harnessed to put an end to this most despicable of all human depravities. Simple but effective.
Check out the Minga website at www.v3.mingagroup.org
Bernie
America through a different lens
May 24th, 2009
There I was sitting in a bar in New York, having just paid US$12 for a beer and really wondering where this great recession was. The hotel where I stayed had a 90% occupancy rate and the guy on the desk assured me that the hospitality industry was alive and kicking. The recession seemed to be yesterday’s news in the BIg Apple.
18 hours later I was on a TV show in Washington DC on a segment on the 9 o’clock Morning Show called Mind over Money. The format was basically a panel of financial experts who were taking calls on all sorts of problems- talk back TV you coud say. Without doubt, the thing which is playing on the real American’s mind, as opposed to the New Yorker, is the worry of foreclosure on the family home. It made me realise, that as a tourist in someone else’s country, it is not until you get out of the big cities, that you really know what is going on.
The property market is still slowing and with it mortgage stress keeps growing. Things are still getting worse, albeit now at a slower pace. The system is not going to collapse, there is not going to be a repeat of the Great Depression, but it’s going to be a long climb back from here to the sustained period of growth that ended just over a year ago.
I am on my way now to Chicago, to meet with David Hale, one of America’s best macro-economic analysts. Watch for the blog which will summarise our conversation.
Arun
Arun Abey Interview on 1233 Newcastle ABC
May 8th, 2009
Arun Abey provides a perspective on the current investment climate.
May 3rd, 2009
In volatile markets, wealth transfers from weak hands to strong hands. Now is a time for strong hands.
Recent turmoil in financial markets has caused concern to many investors. Share markets worldwide have fallen heavily, significantly impacting portfolios, and confidence in the US financial system is weak. It is not every day that major investment banks go broke.
Financial decisions in a downturn can impact our wellbeing for years to come. We can’t control markets but we can control how we respond. Here we try to make sense of the turmoil and how to get through to better times.
How did it come to this?
Share markets, jumpy for 12 months, recently fell further and some are now well off their highs. The issues are complex but the cycle is simple:
| 1. | Low interest rates and slack lending policies make home loans freely available. This works fine while house prices rise. |
| 2. | US house prices have fallen, up to 15%-20% in some areas. |
| 3. | Many borrowers can’t repay loans. |
| 4. | Portfolios of mortgages held by investment banks and other institutions plunge in value. Some firms that are over-exposed, and have too much debt, go under. |
| 5. | Confidence disappears – a classic “credit crunch” ensues. |
Casualties have included Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, mortgage providers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and American International Group (AIG). Merrill Lynch fast tracked its sale to Bank of America to avoid a similar fate. The US government has acted swiftly, bailing out some and proposing a $700 billion fund to help others. Their aim is to prevent a Wall Street event from causing a deep recession.
While this is a real possibility, there are also some pluses to note – lower oil prices, lower mortgage interest rates, and globally co-ordinated government action among them. The world economy has been resilient and remains so.
What should you do?
In the past 25 years, I have seen six major downturns in the share market, each one different. The truth is I know only one sensible way to get through such a difficult period: stay well diversified, ignore “noise” as much as possible and get good advice. Here is some advice on what you can do to manage your portfolio:
- stay diversified. While diversified portfolios have lost ground, if you have maintained a wide range of investments even disastrous results like Lehman Brothers and AIG will have had a small effect
- managing to long-term asset allocations. The evidence of history is that knee-jerk reactions like major switches to cash when share markets fall heavily are very costly. Moving to cash will mean losses are locked in. Any potential to re-coup these losses has gone.
- rebalancing. Make sure you or your financial adviser continues to rebalance between different investment types so you routinely buy asset classes that have fallen in value, and sell those that have risen. Tthis effectively means that over time you consistently buy cheaper assets and lock in the profit of more expensive ones.
- reviewing and appointing new fund managers. Make sure you or your financial adviser constantly monitors managers and stress‑tests their investment processes to ensure these processes remain valid.
- uncovering opportunities. Good investments usually emerge from periods like this. Banks that make it through will be better regulated and may end up with fewer competitors. One of the world’s best known “value” investors, Warren Buffett, recently pumped around $5 billion into US investment bank Goldman Sachs, suggesting he thinks it is undervalued. Compelling opportunities are likely to emerge but risks will also need to be closely managed.
Everyday companies haven’t stopped performing well just because markets are down. Woolworths has strong earnings and growth potential. Their strong full year profit results and revenue growth were better than expected and, despite the current gloom, their long-term earnings and dividend potential is intact.
Coca Cola Amatil is another well-known brand listed on the local share market with solid long-term prospects. It’s been a strong performer, a result of selling more drinks at higher prices. People are still drinking.
Commonwealth Bank is a household name and is a well-diversified bank, one of the largest in Australia. It has benefited from its broad retail base and lower exposure to sub-prime mortgages compared to its US counterparts.
There will be winners from the current turmoil in global financial markets. Lloyds TSB, is a large and stable UK bank with a diversified business model and broad retail base. They have purchased HBOS (Halifax Bank of Scotland) who was impacted by the current crisis. Lloyds were previously prevented from similar acquisitions. Lloyds will eventually profit from increased market share and improved efficiencies. Similarly Citigroup has bought the banking operations of US financial services company, Wachovia. Buying the 4th largest bank in America makes Citigroup one of the three dominant forces in US banking. These three banks – Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup, can use their strong positions to improve business performance.
what does history tell us?
Most forecasts of market direction are worth less than the paper they’re written on. But there are typical market behaviours during and after most downturns:
- it’s different (and the same). Every downturn is different but financial institutions have failed before. The system normally emerges stronger but never foolproof.
- markets typically do recover. When markets have fallen sharply – the 1987 crash, Dot Com Bubble, 1970s oil crisis and so on – they have typically recovered. Sometimes recovery is surprisingly quick, other times it takes years. Only those who are invested participate in the return.
- recovery may come without warning. No-one holds up a big sign saying “market recovery”, so parking too much in cash may mean missing a rebound. Markets often recover from a downturn six to nine months before the economy.
- markets are cheaper post-fall. At times like this, good stocks are thrown out with bad. Currently share prices in many markets are below long-term averages. A combination of fair economic conditions and lower prices sets up diversified portfolios to deliver reasonable returns in the coming years.
what can you do?
- keep perspective. While the last year has been tough, even including this poor recent performance, the past five years have still been good in many markets. The table below shows that shares have a very good track record of recovery in the year following a downturn.
source: Bloomberg – S&P/ASX 300 Index
- try not to be affected by daily news. I’m not attempting to downplay the very real challenges facing markets in the period ahead, but reacting to daily news may be a bigger threat to long-term success than a fall in the market.
- remember why you did, what you did. At some point in the past, presumably with the help of a financial adviser you established a portfolio to assist in supporting the life you want to live. Unless you’ve changed your goals, think very carefully – and consult your adviser – before changing your portfolio.
- be careful how you use cash. Cash is fine for the short-term. But as a long-term investment, it’s likely it will not support the lifestyle you’d otherwise enjoy. Switching to cash in a downturn may simply close the door to an eventual recovery.
- get good advice. If advice is important in good markets, in tough times it’s essential. Work with your adviser so you make the right choices.
Finally, the current turmoil will most likely pass. We don’t know when (no-one does for sure) but all my research and experience suggests it will happen.
Arun Abey, Co-author How Much Is Enough?