“Gold is the universal language understood by all nations.” (George Herbert) Just a few weeks ago, the gold price climbed above $2,500 per ounce for the first time in history. This has once again got South Africans talking about the attractiveness (or otherwise) of gold as an investment. Gold is probably one of the easiest…
A tale of two economies US stock markets continued to gain momentum as January progressed, reaching successive new record highs in the second half of the month as investor confidence in the central bank’s ability to engineer a soft economic landing and reduce interest rates increased. That contrasted with South Africa, where the Reserve Bank’s…
“We cannot reason ourselves out of our basic irrationality. All we can do is learn the art of being irrational in a reasonable way.” (Aldous Huxley). The madness of crowds None of us are rational investors. We’re humans – fuelled by fear, overconfidence, and sometimes greed – to survive. Psychologists have long argued that we…
“What we believe is heavily influenced by what we think others believe.” (Thomas Gilovich) Do you remember 2017? It wasn’t that long ago, but few of us can probably recall what markets did that year. For the record, it was a great year for stock markets. The JSE All Share Index was up 21%. The…
Chances are you think you make rational decisions – about investments and about life. But science has shown that this is not the case. Accepting that you are not a rational investor is one of the first steps to achieving investment success. B is for bias Broadly speaking, there are two types of bias. Cognitive…
2023 will be defined as the year where predominantly negative global economic expectations never materialised and most stock market analysts and economist forecasters were proved wrong. All eyes were on the impact the steep rise in interest rates would have on the global economy, with recession seen as an inevitable outcome. With equity markets already…
By JP Landman This political research note was prepared by JP Landman in his personal capacity. Landman is an independent political and economic analyst, and the opinions expressed in this article are his own and do not reflect the views of Nedbank Group. Why is electricity a game-changer? Antonio Gramsci had it right: ‘The crisis…
This political research note was prepared by JP Landman in his personal capacity. Landman is an independent political and economic analyst, and the opinions expressed in this article are his own and do not reflect the views of Nedbank Group A young friend expressed her dismay about what she had seen and read in the…
The concept of “emigration”, as recognised by the Financial Surveillance Department of the South African Reserve Bank (SARB), has been phased out, with effect 1 March 2021. National Treasury has indicated that the reason for this regulatory change is “to encourage South Africans to keep their ties with the country”. The phasing out of emigration…
