Our Quarterly Commentary aims to carry and share the bulk of our reflections and analysis of the previous quarter. To help cater to your preferences, we've provided various avenues for navigating through an entire Quarter's worth of news and data. 

• You can view the full recorded feedback session (± 1 hour) here for a deep dive into the last quarter

• The presentation slides are also linked below

• And for the real meat, scroll a little further to find the full detailed commentaries on both South African (45 pages) and Global markets (13 pages) and portfolios

• To catch up on past insights, please visit our blog for a recap of previous commentaries. 

And, of course, if you'd like to engage in further discussion, please don't hesitate to reach out. We're always here and ready to chat.

Sending love to you and yours,
Richard and the F&A Team 

This piece was compiled by Brendan de Jongh, SA Head of Research at PortfolioMetrix.

The first quarter of the year saw strong performance from global risk assets. Global bond yields rose modestly over the quarter leading to higher quality bonds, as measured by the Bloomberg Global Aggregate Index, falling in US dollar terms. Lower quality ‘high yield’ bonds, which are less sensitive to interest rates were positive, benefitting from lower duration risk and the markets general preference for riskier asset classes. Brent crude oil rose 13.6% and gold was up 8.1%, benefitting from strong demand amidst increased geopolitical uncertainty. 

 The tables below summarise the asset class movements over the last five calendar years and the last quarter.

For the full Local & Global Quarterly Fund Commentaries, please click the links below.

Provides a commentary on the past quarter, its events and their impacts; as well as more intimate commentary on each moving part within your portfolios.

Provides intimate commentary on each moving part within your portfolios.