Monday morning 8AM: *BEEP BEEP BEEP*
It is Monday morning again. I am getting ready for the start of the week: the board meeting with my fellow board members. The meeting takes between two and three hours. But today was different, we had to keep it short. Jamy (Secretary & External Affairs Officer), Renee (Chairman) and I had to catch the train to Amstelveen.
As of the start of 2016, the AEX index showed a negative return. Recently, February 11th, the index fell from a level of 442 points on January 1st to just 382 points; this decline amounts to a return of -13,5% in just 6 weeks. The reason for this decline: concerns about a cooling down of the Chinese economy. The key indices in China also showed a loss of 7% for several days in January, which led to a trading shut down on these days. An apparently necessary devaluation of the Yuan, the Chinese currency, made investors more worried about growth in China. However, in my opinion, these worries are exaggerated and there are several bright spots on the horizon that are forgotten in times of ‘unrest’.