Biography
Usman Hayat, CFA, writes about sustainable, responsible, and impact investing and Islamic finance. He is the lead author of "Environmental, Social, and Governance Issues in Investing: A Guide for Investment Professionals;" the literature review, "Islamic Finance: Ethics, Concepts, Practice;" and the research report "Sustainable, Responsible, and Impact Investing and Islamic Finance: Similarities and Differences." He is interested in online learning and has directed three e-courses for CFA Institute: "ESG-100," "Islamic Finance Quiz," and "Residual Income Equity Valuation." The other topics he writes about are macroeconomics and behavioral finance. He has experience working in securities regulation and as an independent consultant. His qualifications include the CFA charter, the FRM designation, an MBA, and an MA in development economics. He has served as a content director at CFA Institute. He is a former executive director at the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) and former CEO of the Audit Oversight Board (Pakistan). His personal interests include reading and hiking.
The young and rapidly evolving field of crowdfunding is democratizing investing like never before, making finance — donations, debt, equity — available where it wasn't previously. But to scale up, regulations need to be adopted, says Lars Kroijer.
For investment professionals, a key idea in the discussion of ESG issues is that systematically considering ESG issues will likely lead to more complete investment analyses and better-informed investment decisions.
The traditional investment approach to fixed income links the credit risk of a security to financial metrics like profitability, leverage, and productivity. But modern responsible investing goes beyond that. It also integrates environmental, social, and governance (ESG) metrics for a more complete risk assessment.
Investment professionals can add value in their investment decisions through good governance — not the good governance they preach to corporate executives of public companies, but the governance of their own investment decision-making.
Nouriel Roubini delivered the closing keynote address on the global economic outlook at the 2015 CFA Institute Middle East Investment Conference in Kuwait.
Behavioural finance coach, Paul Craven, shares practical measures investment professionals can take to address their behavioural biases at the 2015 CFA Institute Middle East Investment Conference in Kuwait.
Ahead of the 2015 Middle East Investment Conference in Kuwait on 10 February 2015, CFA Institute conducted their fifth annual Middle East Market Sentiment Survey.
James Montier, a member of GMO’s asset allocation team, closes the 2014 European Investment Conference with the argument that shareholder value maximization is “a bad idea” and has contributed to major economic and social problems of short-termism and rising inequality.
Geopolitical conflicts are connected to economic pressures, said Philippa Malmgren, president and founder of DRPM Group, at the 2014 European Investment Conference. However, Malmgren argued, financial analysts are largely unable to analyse this connection and financial markets fail to respond.
There is much potential for Islamic finance to promote sustainable economic development through such approaches as widening access to finance (including microfinance), financing infrastructure projects, and expanding the reach of takaful (Islamic insurance).