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FTSE hits new record over 8000 points

ended 16. February 2023

The FTSE 100, driven by Centrica's strong results, has hit a new high today, beating yesterday's high, as markets believe the world economy may avoid recession and inflation could fall back. Meanwhile, the FTSE 250 index, which has a greater weighting towards British firms, is still trading around 17% off its 2021 highs. Against this backdrop, a weekend broadsheet journalist wants to know which geographies you are especially bullish about at present, and why. For example, India seems to be a favourite of a number of wealth managers and IFAs at the moment. While diversified portfolios are a necessity, which regions or countrties do you see as having great medium- to long-term growth potential?

4 responses from the Newspage community

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Platinum
Wes Wilkes
CEO at Net-Worth NTWRK
Whilst the FTSEs record high is certainly nice to see, we have to remember though that most of the firms within the FTSE derive their income from outside of the UK & it is heavily weighted with energy stocks that have had an incredible 12 months.
Whilst overall we remain cautious and underweight equities, we prefer Emerging Markets and the Asia ex-Japan region in 2023 as a direct play on China re-opening, trading a larger than usual discount to global equities and signs of earnings momentum returning, we carry an overweight here.
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Premium
Philip Dragoumis
Director and Owner at Thera Wealth Management
Yes, the FTSE 100 has finally made new highs on the back of its large weightings in oil, mining and bank stocks and also the falls in sterling which benefits UK exporters and those with overseas businesses. The index has in fact very little do with the UK economy , the FTSE 250 is a better indicator and that continues to struggle. But a little context is needed, The FTSE 100 has returned 84% in 10 years whereas the FTSE All World Index (in GBP) has returned 183% over the same period . Trying to guess which particular region and geography will outperform every year is a recipe for investment failure, as nobody really has an edge over all the trillions of dollars of daily global capital flows . The best strategy is to accept the market capitalisation weightings within the global index and mirror them- the UK at 5% , and the US at 60%.
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Premium
Lewis Shaw
Owner and Mortgage Broker at Riverside Mortgages
The FTSE hitting a new high has nothing to do with Centrica's strong result. It's because we printed hundreds of billions of money during the pandemic, which has mainly ended up in the banks of people who already own assets and it needs to find a home. That home is the purchasing of further assets, be it stock, property or gold.
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Samuel Mather-Holgate
Independent Financial Adviser at Mather and Murray Financial
The UK market is still good value compared to its peers and with the headwinds of Brexit and government incompetence, you should see the pound weaken further than means most FTSE100 stocks go up, as they make their profits in other currencies. India is definitely an area to be bullish about. Set to be the most populated country, it hasn't had the economic revolution China has been through, but it will. It has intelligent, productive people and should shine over the next decade. Of course, commodities and precious metals will also do well over the medium term as China wakes up from its Covid slumber. These ingredients go into most of our everyday household items, and they are becoming more and more widely used in everything from computers to electric cars.