Welcome from Kenny Rabson

It is my pleasure to introduce our inaugural issue of Invest Insights. This bi-annual publication is intended to keep you abreast of the latest thinking in investments and retirement planning to enable you to better prepare for the future.

The 2017 Discovery Financial Planning Summit that took place in Sandton on 29 May had the theme Future-focused financial planning. This first issue of Invest Insights expands on this theme looking not only at future-focused financial planning but also future-focused investing.

Looking ahead to the future of investment and financial planning, some of the key trends we see emerging, some of which we cover in this issue, are increasing political instability and the impact of this on local growth. South Africa entered a technical recession in the first quarter of this year. GDP declined by 0.7% quarter-on-quarter (annualised), having declined by 0.3% in the final quarter of 2016.

Financial Times undercover columnist Tim Harford writes an interesting piece on still waiting for the robot revolution. Instead of the threat of being replaced by machines, the problem is that we are still waiting for the robot revolution to begin, he says.

The future of global growth hangs in a delicate balance as growth remains largely predicated on President Trump’s ability to deliver on his ambitious campaign growth promises. Michael Power, Strategist for Investec Asset Management analyses President Trump’s first 100 days in office.

When looking to our own future, it is important to know what our retirement choices are and how best to access the products we need. In our Practical Advice segment, we take you on a journey of what you need to know about retirement products.

At Discovery Invest, our assets under administration are now over R69 billion at the end of May, a 13% increase from a year ago. We are also the fastest growing unit trust company in South Africa with growth of 16% year-on-year at the end of the first quarter of 2017.*

The Discovery Balanced Fund has provided highly competitive returns for investors and has maintained a first or second quartile performance position over all rolling three-year periods since inception. The rest of our stable have also performed well, with 76% of our funds achieving first or second quartile performance over the six months to the end of March 2017. This was against a backdrop of single digit market growth (ALSI returns of 2.9% and SWIX returns of 1.5% over these 6 months).

Our shared-value retirement model has allowed us to return over R5 billion in value back to clients in the form of upfront boosts and boosts to retirement income since our inception. These boosts are based on clients’ improving financial and health behaviours, a key determinant of successful financial planning into the future.

The need for financial planning has never been greater than now. Individuals face multiple challenges in saving for retirement. Our aim is to make your investment and retirement and choices simpler, easier and more rewarding.

Yours sincerely,

Kenny Rabson

CEO Discovery Invest

^{Nothing contained in this article should be construed as financial advice and is meant for information purposes only.}

^{* Source: US Global Research Report: SA Insurance Sector, Q4 2016. Unit trust ups and downs.​}