Director's Perspective By Noel Hucker Several key themes are playing out at present. Firstly, all asset classes delivered positive absolute returns for the month of May 2014. Overseas, the United States is broadly recovering despite March quarter growth being negative and we expect the US economy to grow over the medium term. In Europe, interest
The current qualifying age for the Age pension is age 65. It has previously been legislated that this will be progressively increased to age 67 for those born between 1 July 1952 and 31 December 1956. The Government has announced that the age pension age will be progressively further increased from age 67 to age
It's that time of year again! The financial year ending 30 June 2014 is fast approaching and now is the time to start preparing! This newsletter is provided to give you some things to think about which will help you to best manage your taxes, build your wealth and better your financial position for you
Reserve Bank Interest Rate Announcement - June 2014 Today, the Reserve Bank of Australia met to review the official cash rate. They have decided to leave this rate steady at 2.5% pa. The official rate has remained unchanged for 9 months now. We expect that most lenders will leave their rates unchanged, in line with
Director's Perspective By Inbam Devadason Global share markets were generally up around 1-2% over the month of April 2014 and have continued this upward trend in May 2014. Confidence is growing in the US recovery. The US Federal Reserve is reducing its bond buying program such that we expect it to finish by December 2014.
The Treasurer Joe Hockey and the Coalition Government delivered their first Federal Budget on Tuesday 13 May 2014. We are pleased to provide a summary of some of the key announcements from the 2014 Federal Budget. Temporary Budget Repair Levy The Government has announced that it will introduce a ‘Temporary Budget Repair Levy’ of 2%
Director's Perspective By Mario Isaias The GFC was the trigger point for governments to embark on massive spending without finding new sources of revenue. Australia now faces the hard reality that this cannot go on forever. The upcoming Federal Budget on 13 May will most likely take the first steps to addressing this imbalance which will
Director's Perspective By Noel Hucker There’s a great saying about seeing the forest for the trees and it’s easy to fall into this trap when there is so much information and news out there – Russia and Crimea/Ukraine, Chinese production, tapering of the US Federal Reserve’s Quantitative Easing programme, etc. etc. Issues like these have
Director's Perspective By Inbam Devadason Global share markets were down around 5% over the month of January 2014 with concern over slowing Global growth and a natural correction after a strong rally in the 2013 calendar year. Over the month of February most of these losses have been recouped. Confidence in the Global recovery has
Director's Perspective By Mario Isaias Welcome to the New Year and I trust you had a wonderful festive season with family and friends. The previous calendar year will be remembered as one of the better investment years. With low interest rates and central bank support, most markets performed very well, led by the U.S. -
