Thursday 6 September 2012

Richard Cayne Meyer Asset Management Ltd – Common Investments and Correlation in The Markets

According to Richard Cayne Meyer Asset Management Ltd, having a well balanced portfolio with investments which compliment each other is quite important. So many investors end up buying assets or investments that are highly correlated and end up performing about the same. Of course this can be good in a rising market but offers no downside protection should the markets experience a severe correction. This article discusses some of the most common types of investments and how they may be correlated with each other.

Stocks
Preferred stockholders have a greater claim to a company’s assets and earnings. This is true during the good times when the company has excess cash and decides to distribute money in the form of dividends to its investors. In these instances when distributions are made, preferred stockholders must be paid before common stockholders. However, this claim is most important during times of insolvency when common stockholders are last in line for the company’s assets. This means that when the company must liquidate and pay all creditors and bondholders, common stockholders will not receive any money until after the preferred shareholders are paid out. That said most people invest in common stock.

Shares & Debentures
Richard Cayne Meyer Asset Management Ltd in Thailand says the differences are that; SHARES- A Share holder is the real owner of the company and does not have not fixed dividend rate and no maturity period, shares are not redeemable but can be sold. Shares are more volatile and imply a higher degree of risk. A share holder can have high return and share holders have rights on residual income.
A debenture holder is the creditor of a company, they have fixed rate of interest and they have a maturity period but they don’t have any right to vote. Debentures are redeemed, they are not volatile and they have a lower risk and a lower return. Unfortunately over the past few years we have seen a higher correlation of performance tied to both stocks and bonds.

Mutual funds
Mutual funds are also known as open-end-company. These are one of the most popular kinds of investments and provide the investors the opportunity to invest in securities. Though mutual funds involve risks but they also offer two things, that is, the ready diversification and opportunity for the fund manager to outperform the market.

Real Estate Investment
In the opinion of Richard Cayne, Real Estate Investment Trusts are corporations that sell shares for investments in real estate which can be in either residential, commercial or both. This type of REIT (Real Estate Investments Trust involves the buying, management, ownership, sale or rental of real estate properties and mortgages. Again as we had seen during the financial collapse property having taken a nosedive and the equity and bond market went down along with it.

Commodities
According to Richard Cayne Meyer International in Bangkok Thailand a commodity is a product, which is of uniform quality and traded across various markets. There are generally two types of commodities, “hard commodities” and “soft commodities”. Hard commodities include crude oil, iron ore, gold, and silver and have a long shelf life. Agricultural products such as soybean, rice or wheat, are considered ‘soft commodities’ since they have a limited shelf life. These commodities have to be similar and interchangeable or ‘fungible’. Gold as an example had provided an uncorrelated performance throughout the financial crisis up until 2012 and had been a good compliment to any portfolio as it had outperformed most other investments. Now in 2012 Gold seems to be gaining popularity as a mainstream investment pushing up demand for it and as such we are seeing a higher degree of correlation with the equity markets than we used to.

Richard Cayne having lived in Tokyo Japan for over 15 years and at Meyer Asset Management Ltd has ties with over 200 global financial services firms. Richard is Managing Director of Meyer International Ltd based in Bangkok Thailand and is the Asian based marketing arm for the Meyer Group which is owned by Asia Wealth Group Holdings Ltd listed in London UK

Article source:- http://richardcaynes.wordpress.com/2012/09/01/richard-cayne-meyer-asset-management-ltd-common-investments-and-correlation-in-the-markets/

Significance of Asset Allocation by Richard Cayne Meyer International Ltd

In the opinion of Richard Cayne at Meyer International Ltd in Bangkok Thailand, the right asset allocation is the key to a portfolio which outperforms. Asset allocation lets you spread your investment into different asset classes and therefore helps in reducing the risk of the portfolio. Asset allocation is not only about choosing investments in different asset classes but also those that are in different geographical regions.

In fact, the concept of asset allocation emerged with the fact that every investment has a different kind of cycle and associated risks and therefore, investing in different securities will not only reduce the risk but will also increase the opportunities of profit for an investor.

According to Richard Cayne Meyer Asset Management Ltd in Thailand, deciding an asset allocation strategy is a very crucial and important decision for every investor. The right kind of asset allocation strategy will help you balance reduce the risks in your portfolio. During asset allocation, the investor needs to allocate his assets into different asset classes. Some of the most common but important asset classes include stocks, bonds and alternative investments such as hedge funds. Each asset class contains its own advantages. For example, stocks are often considered as the investments that can bring maximum profit to the investors but at the same time has highest volatility and downside risk as well.

An experienced investor knows that information is key to being able to make calculated decisions and financial consultancy firms can be a wealth of information to them. For less experienced investors a financial advisor can help the individual in choosing the right kind of allocation for his assets as well as helping to define the investor’s goals. Contacting a financial consultant is advantageous because he takes complete care of the investor’s portfolio by checking the investor’s risk tolerance level, investment capacity and by choosing the appropriate asset classes for an investor. An experienced and accomplished financial advisor very well understands that every investor expects profit within a certain time frame and so a proper investment strategy should be planned along with an asset allocation strategy. One of the most important tasks for financial advisors is that they help the investors in building a balance between the involved risks and expected profit returns.

Richard Cayne Meyer International in Thailand says that the situation and capacity of every individual investor is different from others and therefore, a different financial investment strategy having its own defined asset allocation strategy may be need.  Markets and asset classes do not move in tandem, what’s hot today may be cold tomorrow. Spreading your investment dollars among different types of asset classes and markets; stocks and bonds, domestic and foreign markets lets you position yourself to seize opportunities as the performance cycle shifts from one market or asset class to another.
Richard Cayne having lived in Tokyo Japan for over 15 years and at Meyer Asset Management Ltd has ties with over 200 global financial services firms. Richard is Managing Director of Meyer International Ltd based in Bangkok Thailand and is the Asian based marketing arm for the Meyer Group which is owned by Asia Wealth Group Holdings Ltd listed in London UK.

Meyer International Richard Cayne – Life Insurance Simplified

Richard Cayne Meyer Asset Management Ltd says; In its simplest form, life insurance is financial leverage.  A small pool of money creates a large pool of money, guaranteed and risks free, for the purpose of funding an identified goal or objective.  Term life insurance is what most people think of when they think of life insurance.  Term life insurance provides a guarantee of a pool of money for a specific number of years, at a guaranteed (never to increase) annual cost, as long as the premiums are paid; usually for 10, 15, 20 or 30 years. The expectation is that at the end of the term, the protection will no longer be necessary, and the policy may be allowed to lapse (you may lapse a term policy at any time by ceasing to pay for it).

Replacement of Income

We use term insurance frequently to provide for replacement of income to a family who is dependent on a “breadwinner’s” income for living expenses, college funding, retirement funding etc.  If we plan correctly, we will accumulate assets during the earning years such that at retirement, the client will be able to produce his or her own income from assets when there is no longer income from employment.  Term life insurance guarantees that the “gap” between today and retirement will be filled if income ceases due to death of the income earner prior to fulfillment of planning.  The downside says Richard Cayne at Meyer International Ltd based in Bangkok Thailand is that Term life insurance is inexpensive, has no internal cash value, and may be exchanged for other types of life insurance which do.

Planning for Certainties in Life

The other most often used type of life insurance is Universal Life.  Universal Life is permanent death benefit life insurance. Universal Life has myriad applications in financial planning, as the death benefit cannot be outlived. Using this financial leverage usually makes fiscal sense when there is a need to create permanent liquidity. Many of my clients use Universal Life to create an estate or to protect an estate.  In case you don’t think you have an estate; you do.  Your estate is all of your “things”, including your financial assets, property, hard assets like art, sculpture and collectibles, your furniture, cars etc… All of it.  Death eventually produces financial liability to the beneficiaries, one way or the other.  Even small estates have expenses, and providing for the extinguishing of these expenses helps to ensure order and facilitate the completion of your plans and aspirations for your beneficiaries.

Richard Cayne Meyer Asset management Ltd having lived in Tokyo Japan for over 15 years can certainly say that Japanese  like other nationalities with larger estates can be devastated by taxes and expenses if advance planning is not good, and I don’t know a single case where the client found it preferable to force the sale of estate assets to pay taxes and expenses rather than have the expenses paid from the proceeds of a life insurance policy which bought those dollars at a deep discount; often a fraction on the dollar. I’m safe in saying that everybody understands that they will have to pay for these inevitable expenses with discounted dollars as opposed to paying for them dollar for dollar.  Some clients want to leave a financial legacy to children, grandchildren, or a charity.  Universal Life allows them to leave a guaranteed, tax free financial legacy which was secured at a deep discount.  Richard Cayne having consulted on many larger Japanese estates says Japanese like other nationalities particularly Asian ones do not like talking about death although inevitable but planning for this earlier rather than later will ensure that your wealth can be passed on in the most cost efficient manner to those you care about.

Richard Cayne is Managing Director of the Meyer Group of companies and based in Bangkok Thailand at Meyer International Ltd.  The Meyer Group has ties with over 200 global financial institutions and is part of Asia Wealth Group Holdings a UK Listed company.

Article Source: - http://richardcaynes.wordpress.com/2012/09/01/meyer-international-richard-cayne-life-insurance-simplified/