Financial news

ETFs in a changing asset management industry

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ETFs in a changing asset management industry

Youssef LOURAOUI

In this article, Youssef LOURAOUI (ESSEC Business School, Global Bachelor of Business Administration, 2016-2020) talks about his research conducted in the field of investing.

As a way of introduction, ETFs have been captivating investors’ attention in the last 20 years since their creation. This financial innovation has shaped how investors place their capital.

Definition

An ETF can be defined as a financial product that is based on a basket of different assets, to replicate the actual performance of each selected investment. An ETF has more or less the same proportion of the underlying components of the basket, depending on the style of management of the asset manager. ETFs represent nearly 90% of the asset under management of the global Exchange Traded Products (ETP).

History

The first ETF was the Standard and Poor’s Depository Receipts (SPDR) introduced in 1993. It appears to be an optimized product that enables investors to trade it like a stock, with a price that fluctuates during the day (not like mutual funds whose value is known at the end of the day only). The main advantage of ETFs for investors is to diversify their investment with lower fees than buying each underlying asset separately. The most important ETFs in the market are the ones with the lowest expense ratio as it is a crucial point to attract money from investors in the fund.

Types of ETF

ETFs can be segmented in different types according to the asset class, geography, sector, investment style among other criteria. According to Blackrock’s classification (2021), the overall ETF market can be divided into the following classes:

  • Stock ETFs track a certain stock market index, such as the S&P 500 or NASDAQ.
  • Bond ETFs offer exposure to a wide selection of fixed income instruments.
  • Sector and industry ETFs invest in a particular industry such as technology, healthcare, or financials.
  • Commodity ETFs track the price of a commodity such as oil, gold, or wheat.
  • Style ETFs are devoted to an investment style or market capitalization focus such as large-cap value or small-cap growth.
  • Alternative ETFs offer exposure to the alternative asset classes and invest in strategies such as real estate, hedge funds and private equity.
  • Foreign market ETFs follow non-U.S. markets such as the United Kingdom’s FTSE 100 index or Japan’s Nikkei index.
  • Actively managed ETFs aim to provide a certain outcome to maximize income or outperform an index, while most ETFs are designed to track an index.

Figure 1. Volume of the ETF market worldwide 2003-2019.
Volume of the ETF market worldwide 2003-2019
Source: Statista (2021).

Figure 1 represents the volume of the ETF market worldwide over the period 2003-2019. With over 6,970 ETFs globally as of 2019 (Statista, 2021), the ETF industry is growing at an increasing pace, recording a thirty-fold increase in terms of market capitalization in the 17-year timeframe of the analysis. It reflects the growing appetite of investors towards this kind of financial instruments as they offer the opportunity for investors to invest virtually in every asset class, geographical region, sector, theme, and investment style (BlackRock, 2021).

iShares (BlackRock), Xtrackers (DWS) and Lyxor (Société Générale) can also be highlighted as key players of the ETF industry in Europe. As shown in Figure 2, Lyxor (a French player) is ranked 3rd most important player with nearly 9% of the overall European ETF market (Refinitiv insights, 2019). iShares represents nearly eight times the weight of Lyxor, which is slightly above the average of the overall European ETF volume in dollars.

Figure 2. Market share at the promoter level by Assets Under Management (March 31, 2019)
Market share at the promoter level by Assets Under Management (March 31, 2019)
Source: Refinitiv insights (2019).

It goes without saying that the key player worldwide remains BlackRock with nearly 1/3 of the global ETF market capitalization. According to Arte documentary, BlackRock is without a doubt a serious actor of the ETF industry as shown in Figure 2 with an unrivaled market share in the European and global ETF market. With more than 7 trillion of asset under management, BlackRock is the leading powerhouse of the asset management industry.

Benefits of ETF

The main benefits of investing in ETFs is the ability to invest in a diversified and straightforward manner in financial markets by owning a chunk of an index with a single investment. It allows investors to position their wealth in a reference portfolio based on equities, bonds or commodities. It also helps them to create a portfolio that suits their needs or preferences in terms of expected return and risk and also liquidity as ETFs can be bought and sold at any moment of the day. Finally, ETFs also allow investors to implement long/short strategies among others.

Risks

Market risk is an essential component to fully understand the risk of owning an ETF. According to the foundations of the modern portfolio theory (Markowitz, 1952), an asset can be deconstructed into two risk factors: an idiosyncratic risk inherent to the asset and a systematic risk inherent to the market. As an ETF are composed of a basket of different assets, the idiosyncratic risk can be neutralized by the effect of diversification, but the systematic risk, also called the market risk is not neutralized and is still present in the ETF.

In terms of risk, we can mention the volatility risk arising from the underlying assets or index that the ETF tries to replicate. In this sense, when an ETF tries to emulate the performance of the underlying asset, it will also replicate its inherent risk (the systematic and non-systematic risk of the underlying asset). This will have a direct impact on the overall risk-return characteristic of investors’ portfolio.

The second risk, common to all funds and that can have a significant impact on the overall performance, concerns the currency risk when the ETF owned doesn’t use the same currency as the underlying asset. In this sense, when owning an ETF that tracks another asset that is quoted in another currency is inherently, investors bears some currency risk as the fluctuations of the pair of currencies can have a significant impact on the overall performance of the position of the investor.

Liquidity risk arises from the difficulty to buy and sell a security in the market. The more illiquid the market, the wider the spreads to compensate the market maker for the task of connecting buyers and sellers. Liquidity is an important concern when picking an ETF as it can impact the performance of the portfolio overall.

Another risk particular to this instrument, is what is called the tracking error between the ETF value and its benchmark (the index that the ETF tries to replicate). This has a significant impact as, depending on the overall dispersion, the mismatch in terms of valuation between the ETF and the benchmark can impact the returns of investors’ portfolio overall.

Passive management and the concept of efficient market

Most ETFs corresponds to “passive” management as the objective is just to replicate the performance of the underlying assets or the index. Passive management is related to the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH), assuming that the market is efficient. Passive fund managers aim to replicate a given benchmark believing that in efficient markets active fund management cannot beat the benchmark on the long term.

Passive fund managers invest their funds by:

  • Pure replication of the benchmark by investing in each component of the basket (vanilla ETF)
  • Synthetic reproduction of the benchmark by replicating the basket with derivatives products (like futures contracts).

An important concept is market efficiency (also known as the informational efficiency), which is defined as the ability of the market to incorporate all the available information. Efficient market is a state of the market where information is rationally processed and quickly incorporated in the market price.

It is in the heart of the preoccupations of fund managers and analysts to unfold any efficiency in the market because the degree of efficiency impacts their returns directly (CFA Institute, 2011). Fama (1970) proposed a framework analyzing the degree of efficiency in a market. He distinguishes three forms of market efficiency (weak, semi-strong and strong) which correspond to the degree in which information is incorporated in the prices. Earning consistently abnormal returns based on trading with information is the opposite view of what an efficient market is.

  • The weak form of market efficiency refers to information composed of past market data (past transaction prices and volumes). In a weakly efficient market, past market information is already included in the current market price, and investors will not be able to distinguish any pattern or prediction of future prices based on past data.
  • The semi-strong of market efficiency refers to publicly available information. This includes market data (as in the week form) and financial disclosed data (financial accounts published by firms, press articles, reports by financial analysts, etc.). If a market is considered in the semi-strong sense, then it must be in a weak sense as well. In this context, there is no additional gain in determining under or overvalued security as all the public data is already incorporated in the asset price.
  • The strong of market efficiency refers to all information (both public and private). Markets are strongly efficient when they reflect all the available information at any time in the asset prices.

Related posts on the SimTrade blog

   ▶ Micha FISCHER Exchange-traded funds and Tracking Error

   ▶ Youssef LOURAOUI Passive Investing

Useful resources

Academic resources

Fama, E. (1970) “Efficient Capital Markets: A Review of Theory and Empirical Work” Journal of Finance 25(2), 383–417.

Business

Arte documentary (2014) “Ces financiers qui dirigent le monde: BlackRock”.

BlackRock (January 2021) ETF overview.

Refinitiv insights (2019) Concentration of the major players in the European ETF market.

About the author

The article was written in February 2021 by Youssef LOURAOUI (ESSEC Business School, Global Bachelor of Business Administration, 2016-2020).

Examples for illegal insider trading

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Examples for illegal insider trading

Akshit Gupta

This article written by Akshit GUPTA (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2019-2022) presents famous examples of insider trading seen across financial markets.

As discussed in the previous post, Illegal Insider trading refers to “buying or selling a security, in breach of a fiduciary duty or other relationship of trust and confidence, on the basis of material, non-public information about the security” as defined by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in the United States of America. Insider trading can be legal or illegal depending on the time the information is passed on to any unrelated party or when it is used to execute the trades.

Ivan Frederick Boesky (1987)

Ivan Boesky, a stock trader in the US, is infamous for his role in an insider trading scandal that shook the American markets during the late 1980s. Boesky started a stock brokerage company named Ivan F. Boesky and Company during 1976 and used to speculate on corporate takeovers. Within a span of few years, his company started generating huge profits and Boesky became a renowned broker. He received new buy-in investments from many partnership agreements he signed. But later, Boesky was sued by his group of partners for deceptive clauses stated in their partnership agreement. The case came under the scanner of the SEC and eventually Boesky was convicted of profiting from M&A takeovers based on privileged inside information from corporate insiders leading him to an imprisonment of 3 years and a fine of $100 million. He then became an aide to the SEC, helping the staff in cracking other high-profile scandals taking place in the US.

Martha Stewart & ImClone (2001)

Martha Stewart is an infamous investor who was convicted of insider trading by the SEC in the early 2000s. Stewart owned the stocks of the biopharmaceutical company, ImClone Systems. The Foods and Drugs Administration (FDA) rejected ImClone’s experimental cancer treatment drug, Erbitux. Stewart had the privileged access to this information by her broker before it came into the public domain and acted on it. By selling the stocks before the news became public, she was able to avoid losses nearing $50,000 that she would have incurred otherwise. Eventually, Stewart was convicted guilty for trading on grounds of inside information and was sentenced an imprisonment of 5 months.

Robert Foster Winans (1984)

Robert Foster Winans was a former journalist at the Wall Street Journal and penned the influential “Heard on the Street” column for the newspaper during early 1980s. His column in the newspaper had the power to move prices for the stocks he was mentioning in his column. He was convicted by the SEC for supplying confidential information about his upcoming articles to brokers who used to trade the shares on his behalf. The case was complex to crack due to lack of concrete evidence in the favour of insider trading being followed by Winans, but in the end, he was convicted of stealing confidential information belonging to the Wall Street journal and was sentenced to an imprisonment of one year.

Raj Rajaratnam (2009)

Raj Rajaratnam was the founder and former manager of the hedge fund group named Galleon Group based out in New York founded in 1997. Owing to his successful investments in healthcare and technology industry, Rajaratnam grew up the market ranks very quickly and gained a huge reputation in the global markets. He made ties with several corporate executives from leading companies and received insider tips and information on a regular basis.

Rajaratnam was convicted of making illicit profits amounting to $60 million by trading on non-public material information and was found guilty for 14 counts of securities fraud. He was sentenced to 11 years of imprisonment and a penalty amounting to $10 million. His prison time was the longest term given for crimes involving insider trading and was a wake-up call for all the individuals involved in such a vicious cycle.

Related posts on the SimTrade blog

   ▶ Akshit GUPTA Insider trading

   ▶ Akshit GUPTA Was there insider trading before September 11?

   ▶ Akshit GUPTA Analysis of the Trading Places movie

   ▶ Akshit GUPTA Securities and Exchange Commission

About the author

Article written in January 2021 by Akshit GUPTA (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2019-2022).

AMF

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Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF)

Akshit GUPTA

This article written by Akshit GUPTA (ESSEC Business School, Master in Management, 2022) presents the structure and functioning of Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF).

Introduction

The Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF) is an independent financial institution and administrative authority which possesses regulatory powers over the financial and banking industry in France. It was created under the Financial Security Act of 2003 with the primary purpose of ensuring protection of investors’ interests and smooth operations within the financial markets.

The authority has an independent legal identity and exercises authority, regulations, controls and sanctions over the players in the French financial system. In 2003, the AMF was formed as part of a merger between several financial regulators including Conseil de discipline de la gestion financière (CDGF), Conseil des marchés financiers (CMF) and Commission des Opérations de Bourse (COB).

The AMF is embodied with the primary objective of protecting the investors’ interests and savings in the financial markets along with monitoring and regulating the markets by issuing rules, guidelines, control measures and ensuring transparent flow of information. The authority is also responsible for issuing sanctions and penalties to market players in case any malpractices occur.

Organizational Structure

The Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF) primarily consists of 2 bodies namely, Le Collège and a Sanctions commission.

The Collège is headed by the President of the AMF, who is directly nominated by the President for the Republic of France for a non-renewable tenure of five years, along with a team of 16 people appointed directly by the public authorities. The operations and administrative work for the AMF is carried out by the Secretary General who is appointed by the President of the AMF and works under his supervision. The Collège has the powers to open sanctions and injunction proceedings against financial participants. The body is also responsible for defining the job framework, setting the budgets and staff remunerations for the AMF.

The Sanctions commission is an autonomous decision-making body that is responsible for exercising the sanctions on behalf of the AMF. The Commission consists of 12 people who are directly appointed by the public authorities.

The executive committee (Comité exécutif or Comex) is an additional body responsible for presenting proposals for the smooth execution of operational and strategic objectives for the AMF. The body is chaired by the President of the AMF and brings in an additional viewpoint to streamline the processes of the AMF.

Powers and responsibilities

The AMF is responsible for overseeing and regulating the activities in the French financial system and its players including listed companies, credit institutions, investment banks, investment firms and asset managers. It also looks after the financial products offered by the stated players in order to ensure the protection of investors’ interests and rights.

The AMF carries the above stated activities by means of enacting rules and regulations, authorizing products offered by financial players, issuing sanctions, implementing control measures and offering mediation system to ensure the smooth flow of market operations. It has the powers to investigate transactions carried out by any market participants to ensure the compliance of such transactions with the financial regulations of the French financial system.

Sanctions and penalties

The AMF is vested with the powers to issue sanctions and penalties to market professionals who act in contradiction to the rules and regulations of the financial system. The power to issue sanctions by AMF is split between the two primary bodies of the AMF that are the Collège and the Sanctions commission.

If any breach is found to have happened, the Collège is vested with the powers to decide upon the initiation of legal proceedings. If the Collège agrees upon initiating the legal proceedings, the Sanctions commission is responsible for deciding the quantum and degree of the sanctions to be inflicted upon the suspected individual/individuals.

The kind of malpractices that can take place in the financial system involves insider trading, stock price manipulations, circulation of false information, etc. which can affect the investors and possess a threat to their investments or financial safety.

The AMF can issue injunctions and individual sanctions to financial professionals (including individuals or firms) depending on the nature and magnitude of the breach that took place.

The Sanctions commission has the power to issue disciplinary sanctions which involve ban on practicing or reprimands and financial penalties amounting to 100 million euros or 10 times the amount of profits made by any individual or organization. The degree of such penalties depends upon the magnitude of the financial crimes involved and the advantages or benefits gained by the suspects.

Relevance to the SimTrade Certificate

The activities of the AMF relate to many topics covered in the SimTrade certificate:

  • The different players supervised by the AMF (listed companies which issued stocks then traded on an exchange, investment services providers such as brokers which provide access to the market, asset management companies which buy and sell securities on the market) are the participants to the market introduced in Period 1 of the SimTrade certificate.
  • Insider trading and market manipulations are linked to the concept of market efficiency introduced in Period 2 of the SimTrade certificate. These illegal activities have an impact on market prices.
  • Short selling is introduced in Period 3 of the SimTrade certificate. Short selling allows to speculate on the market by making a profit when the stock price decrease.

Related posts on the SimTrade blog

   ▶ Akshit GUPTA Securities and Exchange Commission

Useful resources

Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF)

Autorité des Marchés Financiers (AMF) Impose Sanctions

About the author

The article was written in January 2021 by Akshit GUPTA (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2021-2023).

Corner of Volkswagen

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The corner of Volkswagen (2008)

Akshit Gupta

This article written by Akshit GUPTA (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2019-2022) presents the real life case of the Corner of Volkswagen, which is a very infamous example of market manipulation in financial markets.

Introduction

Cornering refers to the attempt of manipulating the market by acquiring a significant portion of stocks of a particular company in order to gain a controlling interest in the market and influence the market in the manipulator’s favor.

Such a manipulation was seen in 2008 when the world’s famous automaker Porsche tried to corner the market of the shares of Volkswagen. This attempt of cornering made Volkswagen the world’s most valuable company in terms of market capitalization for a brief period. It is considered as one of the greatest attempts of cornering ever made in global financial markets.

Volkswagen cornering

In 2008, Porsche made an attempt to acquire Volkswagen by cornering the shares of the company in a unique manner. As per the Volkswagen shareholders’ structure, 20% of the shares of Volkswagen were held by the State of Lower Saxony in Germany while the other 80% were owned by retail and institutional investors.

Wendelin Wiedeking, the then CEO of Porsche, had dreamt of acquiring the Volkswagen group and started accumulating the shares of the company in order to gain controlling interest in Volkswagen. In 2005, Porsche held a 20% stake in the Volkswagen group which later grew to 30% by 2007. As per the rules for mergers and acquisitions, Porsche had to make a mandatory purchase offer to Volkswagen, which was later denied by the shareholders of Volkswagen.

As the 2008 financial crisis hit financial markets, equity markets throughout the world went into a turmoil. Short sellers started increasing their positions in the auto industry since the auto sales faced a sharp decline after the crisis. In particular, short sellers started taking large sell positions in the stocks of Volkswagen in the expectation of a decrease in prices of the company’s shares. But to the short-seller’s misfortune, the share prices of Volkswagen saw an upward curve against the market predictions.

In October 2008, the price of Volkswagen share started representing the weak fundamentals of the industry and saw a downward trend making the short sellers optimistic. But a Porsche’s press statement about its holding position in Volkswagen equity hit the financial markets and panic started building up amongst traders. Over a span of few years, Porsche acquired around 42% of the outstanding shares of Volkswagen by purchasing them from the open market and also purchased option contracts on the Volkswagen shares amounting to 32% of additional shares resulting in potential holdings of more than 74% of the total shares of the company at the expiry of those options.

Press Release:Porsche

Short sellers were holding a position of 12% of the total shares outstanding for the Volkswagen company, but there was only 6% of shares available for public trading (74% were held by Porsche and 20% by the Lower State of Saxony). This created a short squeeze in the market.
Short sellers panicked and had to pay huge amounts of money to cover their positions in the market. This resulted in a sharp increase in the Volkswagen share price, which reached a high of $999 within a span of a few days.

The panic then subsided, and the share price returned to its pre-crisis average trading range of $200. But the sudden upward trend made many traders lose millions worth of investments due to the manipulation done by Porsche.

Picture 1
Source: Bloomberg

Owing to Porsche’s greed, the company fell short of cash to settle the option contracts at the time of expiry and was not able to acquire 75% of the outstanding shares of Volkswagen to trigger an acquisition. The debts that Porsche took to manipulate the shares of Volkswagen and falling car sales, led to the bankruptcy proceeding for the company. In late July 2009, Volkswagen bailed out Porsche and later Porsche merged with Volkswagen.

Aftermaths

Although the two famous automakers merged at the end, the failed attempt made by Porsche to acquire Volkswagen is a classic example of cornering practices used by a company to manipulate the share prices of another company. Wendelin Wiedeking, the former CFO of Porsche, had to face market manipulation charges and the company faced legal proceedings with claims amounting to more than $1 billion for the losses that were incurred by small traders and hedge funds for this unjustifiable act.

Technical terminology

Short squeeze is a market situation where a mismatch of demand and supply (high demand and low supply) of an asset results in the prices of the assets to rise significantly. In generally seen instances, when the share prices of a company start rising, the short sellers rush to close their positions in order to avoid heavy losses. The sudden increase in demand is mismatched with the market supply, driving the prices of the assets upwards in a frenzy manner.

Link with the SimTrade Certificate

The concept of Cornering relates to the SimTrade Certificate in the following ways:

  • About theory: by taking the Financial Leverage course, you will understand how leverage is taken by investors to increase the size of their market position.
  • About practice: by launching the Sending an Order, you will understand how financial markets really work and how to act in the market by sending orders.

Related posts on the SimTrade blog

   ▶ Akshit GUPTA Market manipulation

   ▶ Akshit GUPTA Corner

Useful resources

NASDAQ (01/05/2010) When Porsche Cornered Volkswagen: A Legitimate Complaint

New York times (26/09/2005) Porsche Says it Plans to Amass a 20% Stake in Volkswagen

About the author

The article was written in January 2021 by Akshit GUPTA (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2019-2022).

Are sellers paying buyers to buy crude oil?

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Are sellers paying buyers to buy crude oil?

Akshit Gupta

This article written by Akshit Gupta (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2019-2022) analyzes the crude oil market.

Introduction

Commodity futures refer to a contract of buying or selling a specific quantity of a commodity, at a specific date and a fixed price in the future. Commodity markets function differently than stock markets in terms of its volatility, ownership, and the time horizon for settlement. The commodities traded using such arrangements are those which have a competitively large demand and supply base with fluctuation in prices.  The traders invest in commodity futures to prevent any risks arising out of major fluctuations in the prices of the underlying good. Such futures are traded by hedgers and speculators and the positions are closed by both physical as well as cash settlements depending upon the specific needs.

Crude oil futures

Crude oil is an unrefined petroleum product that is naturally occurring and is composed of hydrocarbon deposits and other organic materials. Such oil is refined to produce jet fuel, gasoline, diesel, kerosene, etc.

The two most popularly traded grades of crude oil are Brent North Sea Crude and West Texas Intermediate with a major difference arising owing to their geographical location of extraction.

Picture 2

The prices for WTI, the American benchmark for crude oil, have been dipping since the advent of the unrelenting price war between Russia and Saudi Arabia over the concerns of cutting supply in the oversupplied markets. However, the price for WTI May futures entered a sub-zero level of -$37.63 per barrel on April 20, 2020, where the sellers of crude oil were willing to pay buyers to buy the commodity over concerns of overflooding inventories and weaken global demand for crude oil.

The exact reason for this unprecedented decline is very difficult to comprehend. But with the information available in the public domain, it is well believed that such a movement was based on the fear amongst the buyers that with the May Futures Contract expiring on 21st April 2020, they would be required to take physical deliveries of the oil and owing to already overflooding inventories, there was a sharp sell-off for the futures contract in the market resulting in a negative price.

Also, unlike Brent Crude Oil, the storage facilities for WTI crude oil are limited to a very handful of places in and near the USA. With the production going on and demand at its very low, the facilities are expected to run out of space in the coming months. This has proved to be a major concern for all the future buyers and the effects were well portrayed by the steep decline in prices.

What is expected in the coming days?

If the current lockdown pertains along with the current level of production of crude oil witnessed in America, it won’t come as a big surprise if the prices of WTI Futures expiring in June also ends up in the negative territory. Although OPEC+ members agreed to slash production output by 10%, the decline was not enough to balance the ongoing demand. With more than half of the world under lockdown and most of the industrial activities coming at a halt, the inventories of crude oil have been running up many folds with limited storage capacities. The negative futures price doesn’t mean that hedgers can benefit from this dip since the transportation and storage costs have seen a steep rise, which will nearly nullify the benefits of negative pricing. Also, if the current health crisis pertains for a longer period than previously anticipated, the markets will take a long time to come to its previous level.

About the author

Article written in June 2020 by Akshit GUPTA (ESSEC Business School, Grande Ecole Program – Master in Management, 2019-2022).

Choisir un courtier en ligne pour investir en bourse

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Choisir un courtier en ligne pour investir en bourse

Prof François Longin choix du courtier

Dans la réalité, les individus ne peuvent pas accéder directement au marché pour acheter ou vendre des actifs financiers comme des actions ou des devises. Ils doivent passer par des intermédiaires chargés de transmettre les ordres de leurs clients au marché. Il peut s’agir d’une banque mais depuis le début des années 2000, des institutions spécialisées se sont développées sur internet : les courtiers en ligne.

Quels critères retenir pour choisir un courtier en ligne pour investir en bourse ?

Les frais de courtage

Pour tout passage d’ordre en bourse, un courtier vous facture des frais appelés frais de courtage. Le montant des frais de courtage est prélevé au moment de la transaction sur votre compte-espèces. Le montant et la structure des frais de courtage sont très variables d’un courtier à l’autre. Les courtiers proposent aussi différentes formules selon votre profil de trading (montant moyen des ordres et nombre d’ordres passés par mois), ce qui ne facilite pas vraiment les comparaisons entre courtiers.

La structure des frais est souvent à la fois fixe (pour les petits montants) et variable (pour les gros montants). Par exemple, 2 € si le montant de l’ordre est inférieur à 1 000 €, et 5 € pour tout ordre d’un montant entre 1 000 et 5 000 €, et 0,10 % pour les ordres d’un montant supérieur à 10 000 €. Notez que les frais sur les ordres passés sur les marchés étrangers (à partir d’un courtier localisé en France) sont souvent beaucoup plus élevés.

Parmi les différentes formules de frais proposés par les courtiers, votre choix sera guidé par votre profil de trading défini par le nombre estimé d’ordres passés par mois. Un profil « Trader actif » correspond à plus de 10 ordres passés par mois.

Le montant des frais n’est pas à négliger car il peut impacter significativement la performance de votre investissement en bourse. Pour un trader peu actif passant 2 ordres par mois pour environ 500 € sur Euronext, le montant total des frais devrait rester au-dessous de 100 €. Pour un trader très actif passant 20 ordres par mois pour environ 1 000 € sur Euronext et à l’étranger, le montant total des frais pourra facilement dépasser 2 000 €.

On prendra aussi connaissance des frais de transfert de compte ou de clôture.

Les marchés et produits disponibles

En France, les courtiers en ligne proposent tous l’accès au marché Euronext qui est la principale place boursière de la zone euro (Amsterdam, Bruxelles, Lisbonne et Paris). Selon vos besoins, il peut être intéressant d’avoir accès à d’autres marchés : Londres, Milan, Zurich, marchés US, marchés asiatiques….

De même, les courtiers en ligne proposent tous les produits standards comme les actions, les devis et les matières premières. Selon vos besoins, il peut être intéressant d’avoir accès à d’autres produits : OPCVM, trackers, options et futures, warrants… Certains courtiers (mais pas tous) proposent aussi de réaliser des opérations à effet de levier – achats et ventes à découvert – avec le Service de Règlement Différé (SRD).

La simplicité d’utilisation de la plateforme

La plateforme de trading doit être simple à utiliser pour à la fois passer des ordres sur les marchés et suivre l’évolution de votre position (le cash sur votre compte-espèces et les lignes de votre portefeuille de votre compte-titres).

On regardera aussi si le courtier propose une application sur téléphone mobile en plus de l’accès internet classique.

Le support technique

De par mon expérience, j’ai pu constater que le fonctionnement d’un compte chez un courtier en ligne (ou une banque traditionnelle) n’est jamais parfait. On peut citer par exemple la difficulté ou l’impossibilité à recouvrer ses codes d’accès. Il est donc indispensable de pouvoir contacter le support technique pour résoudre les problèmes qui se présenteront. On prêtera attention à la plage horaire du support, au délai d’attente en ligne et à la qualité des réponses.

A faire avant d’ouvrir un compte

Avant d’ouvrir un compte, je vous conseille d’ouvrir un compte fictif pour tester la plateforme de trading et voir si elle vous convient en termes d’utilisation : passage d’ordres, rapidité d’exécution des ordres, services associés (comme les alertes SMS), présentation des ordres et des transactions, et organisation du compte. Il est important aussi de vérifier la disponibilité des produits et des marchés accessibles. Tester le support technique – la hotline – est aussi une expérience révélatrice.

Quelques sites de courtage en ligne

En France : boursorama.com et boursedirect.com

En Europe : internaxx.com swissquote.com et keytrade.com

Aux Etats-Unis : etrade.com schwab.com tdameritrade.com interactivebrokers.com voire speedtrader.com et suretrader.com.

Merci et derniers conseils d’un ami

Pour finir, un grand merci au Prof. Jean-Marie Choffray qui a partagé avec moi ses conseils en matière de choix de courtier en ligne. Il me rappelle la lecture de deux livres qui doivent être étudiés très attentivement : Malkiel (A random walk down Wall Street), et, SURTOUT, Clews (Fifty years in Wall Street) – la « bible » pour ce qui le concerne ! Son résumé pourrait vous ouvrir l’appétit https://orbi.uliege.be/handle/2268/225434.

Avant de vous lancer sur les marchés, il est aussi nécessaire de vous former. Le certificat SimTrade vous permet de découvrir les marchés de façon pédagogique et ludique.

Que Le Marché Soit Avec Vous !

Influence des marchés financiers sur les décisions des entreprises

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Les marchés financiers influencent-ils les décisions des entreprises ?

Excellente vidéo de mon collègue Jérôme Barthélemy, Professeur de stratégie et management à l’ESSEC, qui présente une récente étude académique traitant de l’influence des marchés financiers sur les décisions des entreprises (dépenses de R&D et dépenses de marketing).

Cet aspect de rétroaction est pris en compte dans les simulations SimTrade, certains événements des sociétés étant liés à l’évolution du cours de bourse (passé ou anticipé).

L'AMF met en garde les particuliers sur les risques liés au trading

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9 clients particuliers sur 10 sont perdants ! Tel est le constat terrifiant d’une récente étude de l’Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF) sur le trading des particuliers.

L’étude de l’AMF porte sur une clientèle de particuliers ayant investi sur le marché des changes (le Forex) et des produits dérivés à effet de levier (CFD ou Contract for differences). Les résultats de l’étude s’appuient sur les performances de 14 799 investisseurs particuliers actifs, clients de prestataires de services agréés, et portent sur une période de 4 ans, allant de 2009 à 2012.

Les résultats de l’étude de l’AMF sont sans appel et confirment le danger de cette activité pour le grand public : sur quatre ans, le pourcentage de clients perdants tous prestataires confondus est proche de 89 % ; la perte moyenne par client est de près de 10 900 euros entre 2009 et 2012 ; sur ces 4 années, 13 224 clients ont perdu au total près de 175 millions d’euros, tandis que les 1 575 clients restants ont gagné au total 13,8 millions d’euros.

Au-delà de cette grande majorité de clients perdants et des pertes subies, l’étude de l’AMF met surtout en lumière un phénomène comportemental : le peu d’apprentissage dans le temps des investisseurs particuliers. En effet, il s’avère que les traders les plus actifs et réguliers voient leurs pertes se creuser dans le temps.

J’explique les résultats de l’étude de l’AMF par le manque de formation des clients. Si les marchés financiers constituent sans doute l’un des derniers espaces de liberté dans nos sociétés, je pense qu’il est en effet dangereux de se lancer sur les marchés sans formation. Quelque soit le motif – le trading à court terme ou la mise en oeuvre d’une stratégie d’investissement à long terme – je pense qu’il est nécessaire de se former et d’avoir un minimum d’expérience. C’est ce que propose SimTrade avec ses formations (pour acquérir des connaissances) et ses simulations (pour acquérir de l’expérience). L’objectif de SimTrade est double : comprendre le fonctionnement des marchés et apprendre à intervenir sur les marchés. SimTrade propose une formation de qualité déjà testées par des milliers de participants.

Plus qu’une lueur d’espoir…

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Note de marchés de Jean-Marie Choffray

« Les voit-on, comme je les vois, ces carrefours illuminés, ici tout proches les uns des autres, véritables grappes de lumière, et là disséminés comme s’ils marquaient les frontières de grands déserts sans lumière parce que sans universités ? » écrivait il y a quelques années Hubert Nyssen…

Dans un petit livre dense, à paraître dans les mois à venir, quatre professeurs de l’Université de Liège s’inscrivent en porte-à-faux de la sinistrose ambiante dans laquelle semble vouloir sombrer le monde moderne, et, particulièrement, l’Europe. Rédigé dans un style concis et enjoué, ce texte (http://orbi.ulg.ac.be/handle/2268/172118) cherche à partager leurs multiples, et très tangibles, raisons d’espoir.

Les développements les plus récents et les plus prometteurs dans les domaines du droit, de la médecine, de la technologie et de l’entreprise (http://orbi.ulg.ac.be/handle/2268/171844), sont passés en revue. Une multitude d’opportunités nouvelles sont découvertes, véritables gisements d’activités et d’emplois. Et, le fait que certaines de ces opportunités aient parfois tendance à se cacher dans les nuages de la virtualité numérique, ne fait qu’en renforcer l’extraordinaire pertinence. Cette évolution, incontournable selon les auteurs, fait que c’est peut-être à une véritable « Renaissance » du monde que nous assistons aujourd’hui.

A suivre donc… Jean-François Gerkens, Marie-Elisabeth Faymonville, Jacques Destiné et Jean-Marie Choffray, « Plus qu’une lueur d’espoir… » à paraître.

Club des Jeunes Financiers

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Connaissez-vous le Club des Jeunes Financiers (CJF) ? Ce Club regroupe des étudiants et des jeunes professionnels de la Finance, de tous horizons : finance d’entreprises, finance de marchés, professionnels du droit et de la conformité, métiers de conseil…

J’apprécie en particulier la vocation du Club : revaloriser les professions financières dans l’opinion publique et souligner le rôle essentiel de ces professions dans le développement d’une économie, d’une entreprise, d’une idée nouvelle que l’on veut mettre en œuvre. D’un point de vue éthique, le Club essaie d’accompagner les jeunes – potentiels futurs décideurs financiers – afin d’en faire des financiers lucides, bien informés et d’empêcher les excès de la Finance moderne à l’avenir.

En pratique, le Club présente les métiers par des ateliers mensuels, informe ses membres par des rencontres/revues de presse/articles de professionnels, met l’accent sur le développement du réseau professionnel de chacun notamment via l’organisation d’ateliers. En relation avec le Centre des professions financières, les membres sont conviés à des rencontres avec des grands professionnels de la finance.

Contact : Antoine KOFFI (antoine.koffi at jeunesfinanciers.com)

Vous trouverez ci-dessous la dernière présentation de SimTrade devant les membres du CJF :

Publication dans l'ouvrage collectif "Gestion de patrimoine : clés et outils"

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Bonjour,

François Longin, coordinateur du projet SimTrade et professeur de finance à l’ESSEC, a récemment contribué à l’ouvrage collectif Gestion de patrimoine : clés et outils publié par ESSEC Publishing. Cet ouvrage rassemble diverses contributions sur le sujet transversal qu’est la gestion de patrimoine. L’approche développée dans cet ouvrage est que chacun doit s’intéresser à la gestion de son patrimoine. Ceci est d’autant plus vrai qu’en France, les systèmes de prévoyance et de retraite ne cessent de montrer leurs limites, les individus des générations actuelles et futures devant se constituer eux-mêmes leur patrimoine tout au long de leur vie professionnelle pour assurer leurs vieux jours… La devise de l’ouvrage pourrait être : Investissez-vous !

Dans l’article “SimTrade : découvrir les marchés financiers”, Professeur Longin présente SimTrade, outil pédagogique innovant pour comprendre le fonctionnement des marchés financiers et apprendre à intervenir sur les marchés. Ce cas pédagogique intéressera les particuliers qui gèrent eux-mêmes leur portefeuille boursier (compte-titres ou PEA). Il intéressera aussi les professionnels de l’investissement, les gérants de portefeuille, pour qui le trading est la dernière étape du processus d’investissement et pour qui le coût d’exécution est une composante importante de la performance de leurs fonds (en particulier, si les arbitrages au sein du fonds sont fréquents).

Microblogging et marchés financiers

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Bonjour,

L’information est la matière première les marchés financiers. Par “information”, on pense souvent à l’information donnée par les entreprises sur leurs activités opérationnelles et leurs comptes ou encore aux données de marchés comme les prix et les volumes de transaction. Le travail des traders (personnes physiques ou machines algorithmiques) est alors d’analyser le flux d’information (le news flow) pour prendre une décision de trading : acheter, vendre ou ne rien faire…

Le microblogging comme Twitter, symbole de l’immédiateté de notre monde d’aujourd’hui, joue un rôle de plus en plus important. Les tweets diffusent de l’information, mais propagent aussi des rumeurs, ou encore dévoilent le sentiment des acteurs. De nombreux professionnels (courtiers, analystes financiers, etc.) utilisent maintenant Twitter ou d’autres réseaux pour partager de l’information. On pourra lire l’article de Stéphanie Haerts à ce sujet paru sur le site des Echos. Des études académiques récentes ont d’ailleurs montré que le contenu des réseaux sociaux permettaient de prédire les cours boursiers, ce qui peut donc amener certains acteurs à utiliser les réseaux sociaux pour manipuler les cours.

La plateforme de trading SimTrade propose aussi un outil de microblogging sur la page Actualités des simulations. Alors information  ? Désinformation ? Manipulation ? SimTrade vous offre l’opportunité de vous faire votre propre opinion sur le sujet. Empower yourself !

Microblogging et manipulation des marchés financiers

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Bonjour,

L’envoi de messages instantanés via des outils de microblogging est très pratiqué en finance de marchés entre les banques et leurs clients mais aussi entre les banques et à l’intérieur des banques.

Les événements récents sur les marchés financiers – la crise du Libor – montrent que les messageries instantanées peuvent aussi être utilisées à des fins de manipulation des marchés. D’ailleurs, certaines banques d’investissement comme Deutsche Bank et UBS et plus récemment JP Morgan ont limité voire interdit l’usage des messageries instantanées proposées sur les terminaux Bloomberg et Reuters. On pourra lire sur le sujet l’article de Beecher Tuttle sur le site efinancialcareers.

La plateforme de trading SimTrade propose aussi un outil de microblogging sur la page Actualités ds simulations. Alors information  ? Désinformation ? Manipulation ? SimTrade vous offre l’opportunité de vous faire votre propre opinion sur le sujet. Empower yourself !

Pourquoi les particuliers et les professionnels ont-ils peur de la Bourse ?

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Bonjour,

Je viens de lire un interview intéressant de Gérard Rameix (Président de l’Autorité des marchés financiers – AMF) par Bertille Bayart paru dans le Figaro Entreprises (28/11/2013).

Nous y lisons que les investisseurs individuels, averses au risque, sont réticents à investir en Bousre (ce qui est un trait bien connu des Français). Mais, plus surprenant, même les professionnels sont frileux ! Des équipes de l’AMF ont mené des visites mystères pour tester la commercialisation des produits financiers et rares sont les conseillers qui conseillent aux clients un placement purement en actions, même quand le client se dit prêt à prendre des risques !

Je pense qu’une des raisons de ce type de comportement, tant chez les particuliers que chez les professionnels, est le manque de culture et de formation dans les domaines de l’économie et de la finance. Comprendre le fonctionnement des marchés, savoir interpréter le flux d’actualités des entreprises, connaître les fondamentaux de la valorisation des actifs financiers, gérer un portefeuille de titres en maitrisant le triptyque rentabilité / risque / liquidité sont en effet un préalable à tout investissement financier.

Au-delà des clichés véhiculés par certains films, SimTrade propose par son approche originale – apprendre, pratiquer et participer – de former les particuliers et les professionnels aux marchés financiers.

Apprendre avec des cours en ligne pour découvrir la finance de marchés et la finance d’entreprises.

Pratiquer ce que vous avez appris avec des simulations de marchés et d’entreprises.

Participer à des concours pour confronter votre savoir et votre savoir-faire aux autres traders sur le marché.

Psycho Shark : nouveau roman boursier

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Bonjour,

Quel plaisir de vous annoncer la sortie du nouveau roman boursier Psycho Shark écrit par un SimTrader Ashley BOOLELL.

Ecrit dans un style incisif, vous suivrez le protagoniste Roy Dubled, trader dans une société de bourse parisienne, dans ses aventures sur les marchés financiers. Le livre aborde de nombreux aspects de marchés que vous pouvez retrouver au travers des simulations SimTrade : mise en place de stratégies de trading, gestion des risques d’une position, psychologie des traders, manipulation des cours…

SimTrade pour un retour en Bourse

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C’est un fait avéré depuis le début de la crise : les Français sont de moins en moins attirés par les marchés financiers.

SimTrade, comme outil pédagogique pour comprendre les marchés financiers et apprendre à intervenir sur les marchés financiers, devrait permettre d’inverser cette tendance et de ramener les investisseurs sur le chemin de la Bourse. Avec la chute continue des retraites, les Français doivent plus que jamais se constituer un patrimoine tout au long de leur vie professionnelle pour gérer leur période de retraite. Et les investissements financiers avec les investissements immobiliers constituent les deux piliers du patrimoine des ménages.

Une étude TNS Sofres pour La Banque Postale et le journal Les Echos précise cette tendance : les actionnaires individuels se font de plus en plus rares : ils ne représentent plus que 8,3 % des Français (de 15 ans et plus) alors qu’ils étaient 13,8% en 2008 avant la crise. En valeur absolue, cela se représente 2,4 millions d’investisseurs qui ont déserté les marchés. L’étude note que l’exode des particuliers est continu et régulier mais s’accélère depuis 2010. Voir le graphique ci-dessous de l’étude.