Dec 1, 2020

Industrial Commodities Benefit from Hopeful COVID-19 Vaccine News

November proved to be a good month for risk assets, including commodities. The headline S&P GSCI rose 12.0%, outperforming the S&P 500®, which gained 10.8%. Promising developments on the COVID-19 vaccine front as well as a benign outcome in the U.S. elections rewarded risk assets such as energy and industrial metals, while safe-haven assets like…

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Nov 30, 2020

Moonshots: Catching Lightning in a Bottle?

We introduced the S&P Kensho Moonshots Index (the Moonshots index) and its constituent next-generation innovators in our previous blog. An express intent of the index is to identify innovative companies early in their gestation, when the opportunities for rapid growth may be higher. In this blog, we examine how effective the index is at capturing…

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Nov 30, 2020

How Is the ESG Discussion Changing for Advisors?

In a recent webinar I moderated, Brie Williams of State Street Global Advisors joined me to discuss how environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data and investing are now at an important turning point. We ran out of time to answer all the questions we received, and this post follows “Why Now for ESG?” and answers…

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  • Categories
  • ESG
Nov 26, 2020

Using Index Data to Inform Investment Strategies

S&P DJI’s Tim Edwards explores how financial advisors can use index data, human behavior, and SPIVA® results to inform allocations and better understand assumptions about active fund performance.

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Nov 23, 2020

Is South Korea Crowding Your Emerging Markets Allocation?

Key to evaluating core international equity benchmarks is an understanding of the country exposures offered. Developed and emerging market country classification differences between index providers may lead to notable geographic exposure differences across market segments. One of the most meaningful instances of this involves South Korea, which S&P DJI has classified as a developed market…

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Nov 23, 2020

Why Now for ESG?

In a recent webinar I moderated, Brie Williams of State Street Global Advisors joined me to discuss how environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data and investing are now at an important turning point. During that webinar, we answered some advisor questions. I encourage you to watch this replay if you missed it. We ran out…

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  • Categories
  • ESG
Nov 20, 2020

The Market Is Up, But So Is Volatility

So far, 2020 has brought us a global pandemic, a coordinated global economic shutdown, and, in the U.S., a notably contentious election. So it’s no surprise that volatility has been, and remains, elevated. Despite all this, equities have fared reasonably (some would say surprisingly) well, with the S&P 500® climbing 13% through Nov. 19 since…

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Nov 19, 2020

Core ESG Indexing Is Engaged to Drive Change

I define core ESG indexing as the use of indices designed to apply environmental, social, and governance (ESG) screening and ESG scores to recognized and sometimes iconic indices like the S&P 500®, S&P/ASX 200, or S&P/TSX Composite. These headline indices become actionable components of asset allocation when a fund or separately managed accounts (SMA) provider…

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  • Categories
  • ESG
Nov 18, 2020

Record Participation in the CSA Powers the DJSI into Its Third Decade

In 2020, the 21st rebalancing of the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSJ) occurred; however, this is the first time it has taken place solely under the umbrella of S&P Global (after S&P Global’s  acquisition of RobecoSAM’s ESG Ratings business in January 2020). It also marked a new step forward toward greater transparency and insight, as…

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  • Categories
  • ESG
Nov 18, 2020

SPIVA® Latin America Mid-Year 2020 Scorecard: Convergence to Underperformance

We recently published our industry-famous SPIVA report for the Latin America region. SPIVA, which stands for S&P Indices Versus Active, analyzes the performance of actively managed mutual funds against their respective category benchmark. In the case of Latin America, S&P Dow Jones Indices began publishing the scorecard in 2014, covering Brazil, Chile, and Mexico. The…

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