Infrastructure to Strengthen a Portfolio in Volatile Times
Key Observations: Infrastructure owners and operators provide real asset exposure in inflationary environments Opportunities for yield on infrastructure continue to be relatively strong Infrastructure companies have delivered consistent operating margins over time How can investors power through the rising inflation, low real yields and sluggish profits in today’s volatile markets? The answer may be pure-play…
Exploring the S&P 500 ESG Leaders Index – Goldilocks’ Choice of the S&P ESG Index Series
S&P Dow Jones Indices (S&P DJI) launched the S&P 500® ESG Leaders Index in February 2022. The index sits within our S&P ESG index offerings, which has been designed to offer different solutions to reflect the wide range of ESG index investment needs. Sustainable investing continues to gain traction for a multitude of reasons—one being…
- Categories ESG
- Tags carbon profile, ESG, ESG Leaders, ESG scores, S&P 500 ESG Leaders, sustainability, US FA
- Categories
- ESG
Ship Ahoy: Introducing the S&P GSCI Freight Indices
On Aug. 1, 2022, S&P Dow Jones Indices (S&P DJI) launched a series of S&P GSCI Freight Indices, the first of their kind in the market and an expansion of the single-commodity offering of indices based on the S&P GSCI. The S&P GSCI Freight Indices are designed to provide reliable and publicly available performance benchmarks…
Time Sensitivity and Volatility Management
We all know that in the long run, the U.S. stock market has performed very well, compounding at well over 10% per year for nearly a century. We also know that sometimes the market performs very poorly, as the S&P 500®’s 20% decline in the first half of 2022 reminds us. For an investor who…
Commodities Rise 36% in 2022 after a Flat July
The S&P GSCI remained flat in July, holding on to a 36% YTD gain despite the bearish sentiment permeating the broad financial markets. This benchmark for world commodities has proven its merit during extremely hot inflation. The Fed hiked interest rates another 75 bps to fight inflation late in the month, but several factors across…
Schrödinger’s Carbon: Intensity and Paris Alignment
In quantum mechanics, Schrödinger’s Cat refers to the paradoxical consequences of a thought experiment: can a cat be simultaneously dead and alive? A similarly counterintuitive phenomenon can be found in the context of climate-based analysis: whereby an index may boast a relatively low carbon intensity and yet, perhaps surprisingly, not be judged as aligned with…
- Categories ESG, Thematics
- Tags carbon intensity, climate, decarbonization, ESG, Fossil Fuel, IIS, institutional investor, Maya Beyhan, Net Zero, Paris Agreement, Paris-aligned Benchmark, S&P 500 ESG Index, S&P 500 Fossil Fuel Free Index, S&P Global Trucost Paris-Alignment dataset, sectors, Trucost, US FA
What Fixed Income Index Liquidity Means for Insurers
How are index-based strategies helping insurers measure and address liquidity in their portfolios? Take a closer look at the why index liquidity matters with S&P DJI’s Nick Godec, Morgan Stanley’s Meredith Shaw, and BlackRock’s James Winslow.
Steep Declines for Islamic Benchmarks in Q2, Lagging Conventional Indices YTD
Global equities fell 15.7% during Q2, as measured by the S&P Global BMI, accumulating losses of 20.4% YTD. Shariah-compliant benchmarks, including the S&P Global BMI Shariah and Dow Jones Islamic Market (DJIM) World Index, continued to underperform their conventional counterparts YTD in part due to continued weakness in the Information Technology sector, which fell 30.1%…
A Risk Control Approach to Cryptocurrencies: A Tool for a Crypto Winter
Earlier this year, we reported on the volatility of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies overall. In February 2022, the market was slightly down from its all-time high in November 2021. S&P Dow Jones Indices had just launched the new S&P Bitcoin and Ethereum Dynamically Rebalancing Risk Control 40% Indices (CET Close), and we saw that risk-adjusted performance…
- Categories Thematics
- Tags Bitcoin, crypto, Cryptocurrency, digital assets, Ethereum, institutional investor, risk control, S&P Bitcoin Dynamic Rebalancing Risk Control 40% Index, S&P Bitcoin Index, S&P Cryptocurrency, S&P Ethereum Dynamic Rebalancing Risk Control 40% Index, S&P Ethereum Index, US FA
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- Thematics
Commodities: Inflation, Interest Rates and the U.S. Dollar
After last week’s highest inflation print in over four decades, the U.S. dollar (USD) rose to its strongest level in 20 years, as measured against a broad basket of currencies. The euro also hit parity with the USD for the first time since 2002 as a consequence of Europe’s front-line exposure to the Russia-Ukraine conflict…
