AI Fund Awards 2017

Acquisition International - International Fund Awards 2017 5 SilverArrow Capital Group an acceptable level of risk is always a big challenge in today’s environment. Our active ownership strategy in public markets provide an attractive solution to our partners and clients.” Moving forward, Thomas foresees a number of exciting opportunities within his firm’s core markets. Within the US, the pre-election outlook held that slowing population growth – resulting in slower labour input and economic growth – was the ‘new normal.’ Post-election sentiment suggests that we are going to get some fiscal stimulus, but that will likely be ineffective in boosting growth on a long- term basis due to demographic constraints. Economists have been raising their growth forecasts for next year, but only slightly, so you’re looking at a little over 2% in 2017. We could see a quarter or two of strong growth but it’s not sustainable, unless we increase immigration or get a sharp rise in productivity growth. While there are a number of uncertainties in the economic outlook, the largest risk is in global trade. A trade war would boost inflation through higher import costs and disrupt supply chains in U.S. manufacturing. Cooler heads should prevail, but a trade war would undermine economic growth at a time when global trade is already slowing. In Europe, there is no doubt that a backlash against the European political elite is happening and clearly there are issues to work through in Italy, France and other EU nations. Banks remain troubled, the political system is uncertain and the people are unhappy, but our sentiment for 2017 is that the European economy will stay strong. The direction of Brexit is not yet clear. The timetable is slower, practical realities are showing a ‘soft’ Brexit as the likely endpoint, rather than a more divisive, aggressive kind of breaking up of relations between the UK and the European Union. Overall, there are guaranteed to be struggles ahead for the region’s economies, however, in comparison to three or six months ago, the outlook is favourable. The catalysts would be more earnings growth and potential political stability with the upcoming elections in Germany and France. Combine this with last year’s big out flows from European equity markets, and opportunities may surface going forward. Overall these opportunities will provide SilverArrow Capital with a number of great chances to grow its portfolio and expertise, as Thomas concludes. “Going forward SilverArrow Capital Group will continue to build our performance equity activist portfolio in Europe and the US, as we are confident that these markets will respond favourably.”