Where did the smart money go in October?

October saw a tentative re-discovery of risk appetite among global investors, as they finally shook off their long-running preference for fixed interest and re-embraced equity. This ends a lengthy period when investor behaviour has not kept pace with stock market returns. Although many of the worries that have held back markets remain – the eurozone crisis, the fiscal cliff, weakening growth in China – the catalyst for re-embracing risk assets was a series of better than expected economic releases from the UK and US, plus indications from the Chinese government the economy had turned a c...