Australia’s large and sophisticated buy-side community are watching developments on the geopolitical front to prepare for any disruption to their investments, whilst reviewing the implications of Markets in Financial Instruments Directive or MiFID II on their operations and equipping themselves with the necessary technology and processes to prepare for the new regulation that will come into play in January 2018.
Across the globe this year, Bloomberg has organized buy-side symposiums in Singapore, New York, Seoul and Sydney. These symposiums brought new and thoughtful perspectives to a growing community of asset managers, asset owners, pension funds, insurers, family offices and hedge funds. In our polling of participants, some themes that surfaced from this year’s Bloomberg Buy-side Forum in Sydney include:
- 41 per cent of Australian investors polled view geopolitical risks as having the most potential to disrupt the industry in the next 12 months. Over 34 per cent of respondents cited China’s growth outlook and evolving policy landscape as the biggest geopolitical risk to investors, followed by equal votes (26 per cent each) for risks arising from Trump’s trade policies and changes in Europe’s political landscape.
