With much of Australia shivering through its coldest winter in decades, a freeze is also being felt by thousands of everyday investors whose funds have been locked up in a troubled mortgage fund. Angas Securities has frozen redemptions from its $200million mortgage debenture fund until at least December 2016 due to serious financial troubles. The story is a familiar one. The company raised funds from the public and lent it to borrowers, who were typically property developers. The funds raised came from mainly retired people who were chasing higher income after interest rates fell significantly. As it turned out, more…

Economic Overview The global economic backdrop remained mixed in the June quarter. Continued recovery in the US and modest gains in Europe and Japan were offset by a continuing slowdown in China, weak commodity prices and Greece’s recurring debt woes. Globally, monetary policy remains highly accommodative. However, the US Federal reserve has declared its intention to raise interest rates sometime this year if key indicators continue to strengthen. Across the Atlantic, despite an easing of deflation fears and small signs of an economic recovery, the European Central Bank kept rates at record lows and continued its quantitative easing program. In…

Greece and its debt obligations (and default) are back on the agenda in a big way and that means a whole host of experts are filling media air time and column space with what they think will happen next. They don’t know, but they’ll happily tell you they do. If you’re in the market for a doom and disaster opinion there is no shortage of them. There will be volatility, but predictions of a financial apocalypse where Greece sets off a chain reaction that collapses other countries and ends with savings being confiscated are ridiculous. The safest option, we’ve always…

In one corner there are the private economists who might be pushing the subject of their books. In the other corner there are the industry and bank economists who might be protecting their employers’ interests. What are we talking about? The great Australian real estate bubble debate. It kicked off again this week when the media reported on the submission by economists Lindsay David and Phillip Soos to the Federal Government’s home ownership inquiry. The pair claimed housing prices across all capital cities remain grossly inflated relative to rents, income, inflation and GDP.” They were particularly concerned about Melbourne because…

Federal Government has handed down the Budget for 2015-16. As foreshadowed, the Budget contained few surprises with a number of announcements made in the previous weeks. Here’s our overview of areas of interest, as always it is important to note that the Budget announcements are still only proposals at this stage. As you may remember many proposals from last year’s budget are still proposals after they still haven’t passed the Senate! Superannuation Early access to superannuation for people with terminal illness: Amending superannuation conditions of release making it easier for people suffering a terminal illness to access their superannuation benefits from 1…