fund manager views

Seen a lull in inflation

Growth becoming harder to achieve

Pressure from sector disruptors

Emerging market bonds generated decent performance in the first half of 2017, rallying well after weakening towards the end of last year on the US election result.

With many asset classes having been pumped up to high valuations by central bank stimulus, we are concerned that investors are no longer receiving particularly generous rewards for taking market risk.

Valuations attractive

Japan (Topix) is doing well this year in US dollar terms, up 12% compared to 11% for the S&P 500 and 13% for the MSCI World index.

Improved political visibility

Companies with high growth are worth higher price tag

We have recently been summing up our overall market view as being characterised by elevated multiples applied to cyclically high earnings.