Risk Assessment:Gauging the Potential Overseas Pitfalls

Japanese companies are strong,said Geoff Lewis,senior strategist at Manulife Asset Management.We are seeing stocks that we like in Japan.We can still see reason to invest in the Japanese market.They have managed to stabilise.*
The cyclical indicator is showing improvement in the emerging markets,including Brazil.*
The polls on the UK Brexit issue are very,very close.I think for the UK the question is,will the City of London financial centre suffer,lose its allure if the UK leaves the European Union?I think the City will continue to function even if there is a Brexit,Mr.Lewis reassured.*
Manulife is a Canadian full line financial services company.Besides Canada and the world's biggest economies of China,Japan and the US,where it owns the John Hancock brand,it operates in promising Asian economies such as Hong Kong,Taiwan and Singapore.*
iShares Japan ETF (EWJ),iShares Emerging Markets ETF (EEM),Manulife Financial Corp(MFC)

Citi's Global and US Economic Forecasts - what the risks are

In late February,Citigroup issued its global economic outlook.It cut its global expansion forecast from 2.7% to 2.5%.Global prospects are worsening further,with deterioration across advanced economies alongside previous weakness in the emerging markets,Citi's research note said.Britain's upcoming vote on whether to leave the eurozone is a key extra near term global risk that would hurt both the UK and EU economies;while more policy easing from the European Central Bank and Bank of Japan will provide only limited stimulus.*
On 15 April,Citi released its US forecast.Our US outlook has little potential to be surprised on the upside,but the risks are very evident on the downside,said William Lee,head of North American Economics.Risk is from looming uncertainty as to when the Fed will make rate hikes,as well as many important political events here and abroad scheduled in the next few months.Recently reviewed and incoming data imply GDP will grow by 0.9% in Q1 and 1.7% for the year.
Despite such tepid growth prospects,we project a slow decline in the unemployment rate to 4.6% by end-2016,and 4.5% by end-2017.We continue to believe there will be only one rate increase this year-likely in September-unless developments stir financial markets and/or dampen further growth prospects.In that event,December or a later meeting would be a more likely date for an increase,Mr.Lee noted.*
Citigroup (C)

Managing Systemic Risk

A critical part of risk management is understanding the linkage between incentives and risk-taking,Ben Bernanke believes.The structure of compensation is a safety and soundness issue.Our supervisors are emphasizing that maintaining risk management is equally important in good times and bad.The Federal Reserve is the consolidated supervisor of bank holding companies.We are working to bolster the ability of the financial system overall to withstand shocks,creating increasingly stringent standards and targets for market participants.We must be sure we continually increase our expertise,to match it with the situation.A macro-prudential agenda has many elements.Precisely how best to implement this agenda remains open to debate.An approach to supervision that focuses narrowly on individual institutions can miss threats to the financial system,in Chairman Bernanke's view.