Year of the SPAC? Opportunities and Risks in the Listings Boom In recent years, special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) have exploded in popularity and today, they account for a sizeable proportion of total IPO funding. Once viewed as a listing backdoor for weaker firms, they are now seen as an efficient and simplified vehicle
Australia China Trade War And Its Implications The current China and Australia trade dispute is actually a war of words and trade restrictions. And it is largely one way, why? China is imposing barriers with seemingly little response from Australia. The reason is the relative high importance to Australia of cross border trade between
Gamestop, Wall St Bets And Robinhood – What Happened And Why? In January we had a curious situation involving Gamestop stock. The underlying stock GME, was on the face of it unlikely to be the center of such a wild move. GME is a bricks and mortar retail video and
ESG Reporting Revolution – Firms Must Grapple With The Need For Real Numbers As socially responsible investing (SRI) became increasingly important to investors, many companies began to produce glossy annual sustainability reports. However, those reports often offered style over substance and a lack of widely accepted reporting standards meant that many companies were
As LIBOR Deadline Looms, Low SOFR Swap Volumes Threaten Efforts to Build Term Rates LIBOR, which serves as a reference rate for over $300 trillion of global financial contracts, is scheduled to be phased out by the end of next year. At that time, financial contracts will need to transition to new reference rates, with
Governments Are Borrowing At Record Rates, But Yields Remain Low (For Now) As governments around the world roll out enormous stimulus programs in a bid to resuscitate their pandemic-hit economies, government debt issuance has hit record levels. Yet, despite double-digit budget deficits around the world, yields on government debt remain low. Indeed, in some large
Combatting COVID-19: How Central Banks Are Responding To The Crisis Global central banks – namely the US Federal Reserve (Fed), the European Central Bank (ECB), and the Bank of Japan (BOJ) – have responded with unprecedented intensity to the economic crisis that has followed in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. They have rapidly deployed
Winners And Losers As Market Volatility Returns In the years following the global financial crisis (GFC), market volatility remained relatively muted, generally moving within a narrow band. Supported by modest but steady economic growth and accommodative monetary policy, global stock markets experienced few pronounced ups and downs for most of the last decade. Then, in
Which Companies Will Pass the Coronavirus ESG Test? As the coronavirus ravages economies worldwide, companies are struggling to pay workers and keep the lights on. Declining economic activity has sent carbon emissions plummeting and unemployment soaring, and many businesses are now reliant on the government for working capital. Against this backdrop, many are questioning companies’
Coronavirus Downturn vs. Global Financial Crisis When the coronavirus crisis first hit, many optimistically predicted a rapid economic rebound in the second half of the year. The outlook has since darkened, with rising fears of widespread bankruptcies, sovereign defaults, long-term unemployment, and a slow and painful recovery. In many ways, what started as a short
