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Bloomberg
17 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
Bloomberg Daybreak Asia: Stocks Stall on Fed Caution; HKEX CEO Bonnie Chan
Asian markets looked set for a cautious open Thursday, as US stocks pulled back and bond prices climbed ahead of a key Fed gathering in Jackson Hole. The Nasdaq and S&P 500 slipped, while Treasuries rallied on tempered inflation concerns. Meanwhile, Chinese shares listed in the US bucked the trend with gains. All eyes now turn to Fed Chair Jerome Powell's upcoming remarks for clues on the September rate path. For more on the markets, we check in with Tim Pagliara, Chairman and Chief Investment Officer at CapWealth. Plus - Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing CEO Bonnie Chan is upbeat that the return of international investors will help sustain momentum amid a boom in listings and trading. Hong Kong's stock market has boomed this year, with its benchmark index surging and share sales posting a strong recovery as Chinese firms flock to raise capital. That in turn has boosted trading volumes, one of the main drivers of earnings for the exchange. We bring you part of Chan's conversation with Bloomberg's Yvonne Man.
Yahoo
44 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Pension Funds Missing Tech Rally Turn to Completion Portfolios
(Bloomberg) -- Some pension funds are waking up to a harsh reality: they've been left behind by the market's hottest rally. Investors are discovering they're underexposed to names like Nvidia Corp. and Microsoft Corp. — both of which recently hit record highs. The shortfall traces back to active managers, who often sidestep expensive tech stocks in search of other opportunities. Why New York City Has a Fleet of New EVs From a Dead Carmaker Trump Takes Second Swing at Cutting Housing Assistance for Immigrants Chicago Schools Seeks $1 Billion of Short-Term Debt as Cash Gone A London Apartment Tower With Echoes of Victorian Rail and Ancient Rome Now they're shifting course, with the help of so-called 'completion portfolios,' tailored strategies that help plug gaps in exposure. Demand for these vehicles is on the rise, according to asset managers Pacific Investment Management Co., Russell Investments Group, and Australia's Queensland Investment Corp., which together oversee $2.5 trillion and offer the service. 'We have seen a marked increase from our clients adopting new completion portfolio solutions the last 18 months' said Nick Zylkowski, co-head of customized portfolio solutions at Russell Investments. 'Portfolio analytics that measure risk across the entire portfolio are critical to the decision making.' These portfolios are gaining traction as markets become more concentrated, pressuring institutional investors to rethink long-held caution or risk falling further behind. The Magnificent Seven now make up over 30% of the S&P 500 index, up from 10% a decade ago. Surging valuations for the group have powered US stocks in prior years, in turn amplifying the effect of pullbacks like that seen in the past week. The strategy involves pension systems pooling together their various managers' holdings, measuring where the combined portfolio falls short of a benchmark, and then uses a separate sleeve — often derivatives or baskets of stocks — to fill in the missing exposures. The idea is not to chase returns but to cut the risk of drifting too far from the market itself. Melbourne-based Mercer Superannuation Australia Ltd. is one pension that has leaned into the strategy to avoid underperformance in the past fiscal year. 'When we look across the universe of active global equity managers, we find that the overwhelming majority have been materially underweight to these large US technology companies,' said Mercer Chief Investment Officer Graeme Miller, who manages A$74 billion ($48 billion) in assets. LegalSuper, which has A$7 billion in assets, uses completion portfolios to hedge concentrated exposures. Relying on external active managers usually 'means that you're underweight the big mega caps,' said interim CIO Andrew Lill. 'As a result, there's an increasing need to reduce active risk,' through completion portfolios, he said. Still, they're not a cure-all. AustralianSuper, the country's largest pension with A$388 billion under management, uses completion portfolios but still blamed underweight exposure to megacap US tech in externally managed funds for lackluster returns last year. Others avoid them altogether. 'There are some great alpha opportunities out there,' said Mark Rider, chief investment officer of Brighter Super, a A$35 billion fund, according to their website. A completion portfolio would 'override' their contribution, he said. Benchmark Mismatches The strategy is also gaining traction in fixed income. Active bond managers are preferring corporate debt for higher yields, which creates a mismatch against benchmarks, according to Stuart Simmons, head of multi-asset solutions in the Liquid Markets Group for Queensland Investment Corp. As a result, more large investors are using completion portfolios to load up on US Treasuries exposure, Simmons added. Other investors have turned to the portfolios to manage risk across asset classes, aligning exposure to growth proxies in stocks, bonds and commodities, said Sam Watkins, who heads business in Australia and New Zealand at Pimco. 'What has changed is that it was a very narrow subset that we were dealing with in the past, and that now has broadened into a much larger group,' Watkins said, referring to the use of the strategy. (Updates fifth paragraph to show recent pullback in tech stocks. An earlier version corrected the spelling of Stuart Simmons) Foreigners Are Buying US Homes Again While Americans Get Sidelined What Declining Cardboard Box Sales Tell Us About the US Economy Women's Earnings Never Really Recover After They Have Children Survived Bankruptcy. Next Up: Cultural Relevance? Americans Are Getting Priced Out of Homeownership at Record Rates ©2025 Bloomberg L.P. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Fast Company
an hour ago
- Fast Company
We finance our disadvantages—and call it progress
A lot of people are getting fed up with how powerful people and institutions benefit themselves while things get worse by the day for the rest of us. Especially younger generations. But it seems to me that choices made by everyday people—often in how they spend their dollars—have the effect of increasing inequity. Middle and working class people buy into systems that increase unfairness and tilt the scales further towards the wealthiest in our society. Take Robinhood, for example. When the investment platform launched in 2013 as the first major broker eliminating commissions and minimums for stock trading, it positioned itself as 'democratizing finance for all.' The supposedly 'disruptive' trading platform got 56% of its 2024 revenue from payment for order flow from large financial institutions. Another 12% came from Citadel, an extremely successful hedge fund controlling 40% of trades from nonprofessional individual investors, called retail investors. Yet it purported to democratize investing for retail investors. When 56% of revenue comes from one type of financial institution, it suggests that those are Robinhood's real customers. Not to mention, the platform has been fined and sued over issues like the trading gamification, misleading communications, and risk oversight. Robinhood incurred outages and technical difficulties during high market volatility periods, costing users substantial losses. And don't forget January 28, 2021, when Robinhood halted the purchase (but not the sale) of certain stocks that were the focus of grassroots retail trading campaigns, notably GameStop and AMC, citing 'risk management' and clearinghouse deposit requirements. It's no surprise to skeptical investors that market makers (like Citadel) had significant loss exposure to the stocks in question. In the hedge funds' pockets The trading platform that named itself after the famous mythical character who steals from the rich and gives to the poor was doing just the opposite—proving with its actions it was in the monied hedge fund crowd's pockets all along. You'd think that Robinhood was delivering on its promise by looking at its stock price chart. The company is a Wall Street darling, its stock continuing to climb, often supported by investments from the 32% individual retail stock owners. Our company, is a free investment research platform with a newsletter suggesting stock picks to retail investors. For a long time, we warned of Robinhood's dangers because it exacerbates the established market players' existing advantages. But Robinhood's stock gained such a groundswell of retail and institutional support that we recently flipped to recommending the stock on the same basis that a lot of people seem to use it. My attitude when we flipped our stance was, 'Our signals love this stock; we have an obligation to report on the best investments and not cloud our recommendations with personal moral judgements.' While this might seem like a sad capitulation, and it is, there is a silver lining. The power of the individual You see, Prospero's algorithms only show how the market is moving in aggregate. To give truly good and unbiased investing advice, I feel obligated to follow the very accurate results our signals indicate. But all of Prospero's collected data are built on many, many small decisions—often made by individuals. When analysis increasingly rules decision making, individuals have the power to move markets if they are willing to adhere to their own principles, and not institutions' principles. If individual investors stop using and investing in Robinhood, investing algorithms like ours at Prospero will not continue favoring Robinhood. And this applies to all systems. There are more middle and working class people than uber wealthy people. If the collective puts actions behind principles favoring themselves, our society's principles will have to change too. The crypto revolution This brings me to the next horizon in the financial industry—the crypto 'revolution.' We have been similarly concerned with the structures it creates but also unable to ignore the extreme positive momentum. For example, COIN (Coinbase) has been one of our more consistent recommendations the last few years. I can't help but see even bigger risks here, though. Few things have gotten the American people up in arms more than a massive financial crisis. Yet with all of the talk about crypto improving things, we have seen it be a hotbed of criminal activity, and the systemic risks posed by increasing capital into it are astounding and seemingly never discussed. For example, crypto products and platforms frequently fail to provide full or accurate information about risks, operations, management, or associated costs to users. Crypto platforms also reuse client assets as collateral for multiple loans, creating cascading chains of leverage that amplify systemic risk far beyond what's visible. Conflicts of interest and insider dealings can be hidden in crypto markets, unlike traditional regulated financial markets that require comprehensive public disclosures. Platform operations and market making in crypto can be nontransparent, allowing exchanges or insiders to profit at customer expense—sometimes even trading against their own users. Scams, phishing attacks, and exchange hacks are rampant. The irreversibility of crypto transactions means most victims never recover their assets. This hasn't stopped crypto from becoming a more interesting space for retail investors who own 20% of stocks versus 85% of Bitcoin. I hope this information has the appropriate impact. Whenever we let institutions and insiders add too much leverage, the system breaks. The more money in crypto, the harder the system will break. Why do retail investors help usher in self-destructive systems? Crypto investors and market makers are operating for themselves. When will individuals learn to do the same? The world changes when people stop feeling defeated and start living by their principles. If we all exercise our power, the masses will become unstoppable. Look at our current society. You'll find scorn and distaste for the billionaires galivanting the country on the backs of the working class. But at least these billionaires have figured out something valuable: how to operate for themselves. Don't take this writing as a call for middle and working class people to band together to act in one way. Act for yourself—not for institutions. Act in ways that will truly benefit you and your family in the long term. I have a feeling that if we all do that, it will lead to a more equitable society, which is where I, for one, want to live.
