Worldwide Financial Planning

Downturns are painful. They frighten people because the headlines are loud, and the recovery date is never printed neatly on the first page. Nobody rings a bell at the bottom.

Equity markets were less active this week. Broadcom’s update was positive but fell short of expectations, holding back AI-related tech stocks.

This week, Washington and Tehran moved closer to a deal that would extend the ceasefire by 60 days and reopen the Strait of Hormuz, with Brent slipping to $91 a barrel by Friday morning. The terms remain pending Trump’s signature, but Chevron’s chief warned that inventory buffers are drawn down to the point where physical prices will rise into June and July regardless.

Passive investing used to be cheap, dull, sensible, cardigan-like. While the active fund managers waved their colourful charts around and explained why this was the year for their underperforming genius to reappear, trackers simply got on with the job.

This week brought news of the impending IPO of Elon Musk’s SpaceX. If it achieves its rumoured valuation of $1.75tn, it would be the seventh largest US listed company, worth more than Meta, Berkshire Hathaway and Walmart.

A fund should have a job. It may be there to give broad global equity exposure, provide UK dividend income, diversify away from shares through bonds, add smaller-company risk, or act as a specialist satellite holding. Fine. But if neither investor nor adviser can explain that job in plain English, the fund has already failed the first Lynch test.