This week saw the footballing world descend into frenzy, with Lionel Messi handing in a transfer request to Barcelona. With contentious contract clauses and even potential lawsuits, it can be assured that the Spanish giants will not let the Argentinian go quietly. Pardon the pun, but things could get Messi! Purchase price to one side, The Weekly has been questioning, who can actually afford to foot Messi’s extravagant wage bill, with Barcelona expected to be forking out a cool £70 million to the maestro for the upcoming season? Man City are currently the bookies' favourites, but even for them they will be breaking the bank. For perspective, their current three highest-paid players, Sterling, Aguero and De Bruyne are (only!) expected to make a combined £43 million for the 20/21 season. Even so, this hasn’t stopped clubs from dreaming. Just ask Andy Murray who jokingly, and in his usual dulcet manner, suggested Messi may be off to the Scottish Premier League. Perhaps Sir Andy should stick to what he is good at, and concentrate on his matches at the US Open which starts tomorrow, his first Grand Slam since returning from injury.

Bfinance’s Mandate Trends webinar was held earlier this week, revealing the results of their investor survey from the first half of 2020.The global consultancy firm surveyed a broad range of investors including pension funds (52%), insurers, endowments, family offices and others. The overarching sentiment was that most investors (82%) are in a ‘wait and see’ mode. The Weekly was of course drawn to the real estate figures where 52% of investors were supposedly satisfied with their actively managed strategies during the year to date, and 13% very satisfied. The Weekly wonders whether any of the respondents were responsible for rent collection during that period! Not surprisingly, given their absurdly low coupons, the survey showed a notable shift in sentiment away from fixed income since January 2020. Top of the pops are the private markets where 48% of investors state that their exposure will increase even further in 2020. Indeed, 33% of investors have so far invested in distressed or opportunistic strategies explicitly looking to benefit from the COVID-19 fall out, whilst a further 22% are ‘interested in doing so.’ Looking specifically at real estate, Bfinance noted that despite the pandemic, the asset class continues to have a broad appeal, with current mandate trends looking to focus on impact, social housing and value-add type strategies, coincidentally in line with St Bride’s Managers’ most recent Partnership, St Bride’s White Rose Residential LP.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times...? Security was increased the last time Frans Hals’s painting ‘Two Laughing Boys with a Mug of Beer’ was stolen from a small Dutch museum, but it was not enough to stop art thieves prying open the back door and making off with it for a third time! The painting was first stolen in 1988 and recovered three years later. It was then taken again in 2011, re-appearing six months after. Who knows how long it will disappear for this time round? Art detectives said that thefts like this are often tied to criminals exchanging the art for shorter jail times. Examples include drug dealer, Kees Houtman, trying to exchange Van Gogh paintings for a reduced sentence in the 1990s. Although authorities have a good track record in finding stolen art, works can often disappear for years. It took 23 years for a Gustav Klimt painting to be eventually found by the resident gardener in a hole in the gallery wall from where it was stolen! The Weekly are no experts, but might we suggest looking there first?