Maintaining profitability will be an area of focus for retail banks during 2020, with myriad issues to be addressed. Increased competition from digital challengers is an obvious area of concern for traditional high street banks. However, there are challenges ahead for the entire sector, old and new.

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) today published its second statistical report on European Union (EU) Alternative Investment Funds (AIF). The study found that the EU AIF sector in 2018, as measured by Net Asset Value (NAV), amounted to €5.8tn or nearly 40% of the total EU fund industry. The report is based on data from 30,357 AIFs, or almost 100% of the market.

Figures published by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) in August 2019 showed UK registrations of fully electric vehicles were up by 158% year-on-year.

Over the past twelve months, the US/China trade dispute has dominated headlines and commanded a considerable slice of the world's attention. Yet, while any breakthrough would be significant for investors and positive for sentiment in Emerging Markets (EM), we think there are several other areas that could throw up positive surprises...

ESG and climate risks appear to be a real source of concern for most of those who responded to the request for information that the EIOPA conducted in order to prepare its opinion. The EIOPA rendered its opinion on 30th September; at this stage it advises undertakings to incorporate these risks only into their governance and risk management...