Financial Mail announces top analysts for 2017

(c) Dmitriy Shironosov - 123RF.com

The annual Financial Mail Top Analyst Awards in association with IRESS and the JSE took place on Wednesday, 24 May at the Empire Conference and Events Venue at Times Media’s new purpose-built headquarters, Hill on Empire in Johannesburg.

The Awards recognise South Africa’s top analysts in the institutional stock broking industry.

Standard Bank SBG Securities was once again awarded as the Overall Top firm for Research, with its analysts claiming top spot in nine of the 41 research categories considered. Peregrine Securities was announced as the Top firm for derivatives dealing; Absa Capital as the Top firm for fixed interest securities dealing; and RMB Morgan Stanley as the Top firm for equities dealing. RMB Morgan Stanley was also awarded in the Corporate Access, Administration, and Sales Team categories.

The results are based on a survey of institutional investors by Intellidex, with which the Financial Mail has been associated since 1975.

The Financial Mail Ranking the Analysts survey is estimated to cover 90% of the institutional market through confidential questionnaires completed by domestic institutional clients of South African stockbroker firms.

The strength of the brokerage sector underscores why the World Economic Forum ranked SA second out of 139 countries for having a financial sector that meets businesses' needs.

Financial Mail's editor, Rob Rose said the results illustrated the formidable strength of SA's large brokerage institutions at a particularly crucial time for the industry and country as a whole.

“Despite signs of strain in the market, this research shows that the need for solid, reliable analysis and execution skills has only increased in an investment environment struggling to get a handle on asset pricing following the recent credit downgrades. And crucially, demand from SA investment institutions remains undiminished,” he said.

Lara Simpson of BPI Capital Africa was awarded as Young Analyst of the Year in the equities category, while Emlyn Flint of Peregrine Securities won in the non-equities category.

A special report on the 2017 research findings is available in the Financial Mail today, 25 May 2017.