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Wall Street Journal, The (Europe) {Main}
Friday 9, April 2010
20
Investors
may want
to flip coin
in U.K. poll
How does the party in power affect U.K. capital-market returns?
Analysis by Fidelity International
shows that, overall, Conservatives
have been marginally better for investors during their 14 terms in office since 1900—but there is little
correlation between markets’ returns and the party in power.
Equity investors received positive cumulative returns after inflation in 10 Tory administrations (77%
of their administrations). Bond investors saw positive real returns in
eight
Tory
terms (61% of
their administrations). With
Labour, equity investors received
positive returns after inflation in
five of the seven, or 71%, of terms
since 1902. Bond investors saw positive returns in four terms (57%).
Equity investors have enjoyed
their best and worst annual returns
under a Conservative: Winston
Churchill’s second term (1951-55)
brought returns of 19.7% and a negative return of 11.5% was recorded
during Neville Chamberlain’s tenure
(1937-40). By contrast, bond investors saw their best and worst returns under Labour. Under Ramsay
MacDonald (1929-35), in the wake of
the Wall Street crash, returns hit
15.8%, compared with -13.1% under
Harold Wilson (1974-76). Conservative Andrew Bonar Law’s term (October 1922-May 1923) was excluded
because it lasted less than a year.
—Richard Inman
software provider were named winners of a U.K.-run competition on
collaboration and innovation.
The National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts, or
Nesta, a U.K. endowment, named
McLaren Group, Wikihow, Cloudmade, Zopa Ltd. and OpenOffice.org
as the winners of its “open innovation” contest.
McLaren won the main open innovation award, for creating markets outside of its car business. The
judges cited its collaboration with
the U.K.’s National Air Traffic Control Service, which uses McLaren
software to predict airports’ traffic
movements.
Cloudmade’s award was for its
process for producing maps by tapping into thousand of contributors
around the globe. Cloudmade’s interface mapped Haiti and provided
maps for emergency services after
the earthquake, according to Roland
Harwood, director of open innovation at Nesta. WikiHow’s award was
for its “simple solutions to everyday
problems by applying the wisdom of
crowds” to create “how to” manuals.
OpenOffice.org won for open-source
software , while Zopa won the open
business award.
—James Mawson
Financial News
Get more from the world’s finance
capitals at efinancialnews.com, and
get intraday updates at efinancialnews.com/blog.
‘Open innovation’ awards
A maker of Formula 1 racing
cars, a how-to-manuals publisher, a
mapping business, a lender and a
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