Over the long haul, small-caps have historically outperformed large caps, fuelling the research highlighting the so-called 'small-cap effect' ? the idea that smaller companies offer higher risk-adjusted returns than larger ones. Unfortunately, the higher interest rate environment of recent years has proved tough for the stock market's small fry, who've spent more than a decade lagging more sizeabl

The Global Smaller Companies Trust (GSCT) 166pMarket cap: £794.4 millionDespite the recent stock market dominance of mega-cap US tech companies, high-quality smaller caps have a longer term record of outperforming. With greater inherent growth potential than their large cap brethren, small caps tend to fare well in a falling interest rate environment and with borrowing costs on the way down in t

There's no doubt the shock departure of a star fund manager or well-followed stock picker is a red flag, but there are various reasons why successful portfolio managers choose to leave their investment management firm and therefore their funds.And, as with most aspects of investing, there are no hard and fast rules about what investors should do when their fund manager ups sticks. Much depends on

US-listed large-caps shone last year with shares in mega-caps, and the ?Magnificent Seven? in particular, surging higher. However, this outperformance only widened the valuation gap between US large and small-caps and left shares in the latter cohort languishing at the low end of historical valuations.Over one and five years, the Russell 2000 index of US small-cap stocks is up 14.6% and 30.5% at t

Saving for the future is not always front of mind for most people which is understandable given the cost-of-living crisis and the need to balance household budgets.This is a shame because the sooner an investor can get started the better their chances are of building a decent nest egg. In this article we show how you can go from a starting point of investing £200 per month, building up your contr

During volatile market conditions and high inflation, investors are looking for ways to protect their income. Investment trusts have an income advantage which is particularly important for seekers of rising payouts.This is because they are able to hold back up to 15% of the income they receive from their investments in their revenue reserves. They can use these reserves to boost dividends during l

Inflation is running at 40-year highs with June consumer prices increasing by more than 9% year-on-year on both sides of the Atlantic.Unsurprisingly it continues to grab headlines and keeps investors' attention firmly fixed on central bank interest rate rises designed to cool the economy.Supply shortages created by the reopening of the world economy have been exacerbated by the war in Ukraine and

Prices of everything from oil and wheat to nickel are surging amid forecasts that supplies from Russia and Ukraine will be disrupted. This threatens to hurt corporate earnings and curb business investment, and at the same time cause consumers to scale back their spending, both leading to economic weakness.The S&P GSCI Commodity index, made up of a basket of commodities across the spectrum from agr

A month ago (Shares, 26 Nov 2020) this column flagged how commodity prices were rising and how this could be a possible harbinger of inflation, whether it was down to near-term factors such as a La Niña weather pattern or something more deep rooted.The answer will only become clear with the fullness of time but one trend is worthy of further attention, namely the movement in the S&P GSCI Ag

Commodities, which cover everything from oil to copper to corn, play a central role in our lives. They fuel the cars we drive, line the cables which keep us online and some are in the meals we eat.Investing in this space used to be the preserve of the professionals but several developments, most notably the emergence of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), have enabled ordinary investors to get in on the

Following readers' requests (see Letters, page 54), we are happy to reveal the performance of trades we have suggested in the Commodities section of Shares. Over the past six months, our 61 trades have produced an average 4.4% gain. This is more than double the 1.8% achieved by one of the top global benchmarks, the S&P GSCI Commodity Total Return Index.Resource fans will know that life is tough fo

In one of his celebrated Low life columns, racing journalist Jeffrey Bernard quipped that in the space of one ten-minute sojourn in a Berkshire pub he had been offered a fight, a large unsolicited loan, a whole poached salmon, marriage and ten tips for a ten-horse race taking place that afternoon. As one year rolls over in the next, it is easy for investors to feel equally bewildered as they are c

Consider going long of Brent crude oil and short of West Texas Intermediate (WTI). An imminent reweighting of a key commodities index is likely to increase the spread between the main European and US benchmarks from the current differential of $22 a barrel.This trade can be executed by buying ETFS Brent 1mth (OILB) and ETFS Short WTI Crude Oil (SOIL), both available to trade on the London Stock Ex