It's good to talk telecoms: Why the forgotten sector for equity investors is key to the digital revolution

Comms giants crucial elements in economic recovery

The telecommunications sector has been a graveyard for investors for many years now, with shareholder returns falling way short of the wider market. Over the past five years, the MSCI World Index has delivered a return of 81%.

In comparison, the MSCI World Telecom Services index has returned 3%. Not per annum; in total. Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of this huge underperformance has been that it has occurred when the growth in the core underlying commodity supplied by telecom operators - high-speed data - has been exponential. So what is going on, and will we see a recovery in this forgotten equity sector? The key to the story is infrastructure. Investors can identify those infrastructure assets required to support the growth of high-speed data, which we know will be an unbroken, continuous and glob...