What a year 2021 has been. From a muted sense of optimism to despair amid months of lockdown, to a fresh new global threat in the form of Omicron, and hordes of rate and inflation-related news, 2021 was an eventful year to say the least.
But before we farewell the year that has been, let’s have a quick look at the news that made headline on InvestorDaily this year.
1. Australia’s best and worst performing super funds revealed
Super always draws a considerable number of eyeballs, but this article exploded on InvestorDaily as our readers rushed to see how the custodians of their hard-earned funds had performed.
In this piece we unveiled the latest Fat Cat Funds Report by StockSpot, which looked at the bottom 10 performing super funds within a particular risk group such as balanced or growth.
In comparison to the YourSuper tool, which provides a comparison of 80 MySuper products based on annual fees and performance over six years, StockSpot said it had analysed over 600 retail and industry funds for its report.
To read more click here.
2. Inaugural YFYS results unveiled
Next in line were the official Your Future, Your Super findings.
Namely, in August, APRA released the results of its inaugural performance test, revealing that a total of 13 funds have failed to meet the objective benchmark.
The results showed that 76 MySuper products had been assessed, with at least five years of performance history against the objective benchmark. A total of 13 products failed to meet the objective benchmark.
Find out more here.
3. Super dominates
Super was popular in 2021, with the news that plans to merge NGS Super and Australian Catholic Super had been scrapped making headlines in August.
The funds, at the time, confirmed that the merger will not go ahead “following discussions and extensive due diligence”.
The merger was first announced in mid-August 2020 that was to create a $21 billion superannuation fund.
The resulting combined fund would have around 200,000 members in the independent and Catholic school and community sectors.
Click here for more.
4. ASIC cancels AFS licence of fund manager
ASIC makes an appearance in our top five with news that dates back to November. Namely, at the time, the corporate regulator announced the licence of Future Asset Management International (FAMI) was cancelled effective from 5 November as the company is in liquidation.
FAMI has held its AFS licence since 5 October 2012.
Read more here.
5. Australia’s first crypto-ETF makes historic debut
In early November, and a week after ASIC gave crypto-asset linked exchange-traded funds (ETF) the go-ahead, the BetaShares Crypto Innovators (CRYP) ETF smashed trading records.
Ahead of the launch of the CRYP ETF, BetaShares CEO Alex Vynokur said that he expected significant demand for the fund to come from experienced and first-time crypto investors.
Find out more here.
