By DPA,
Sydney : A World Cup treat for researchers at the big investment banks is trying to pick a winner on company time.
Australia’s Lowy Institute looked at predictions from JPMorgan Chase & Co, Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Swiss-based UBS Securities and an assessment appeared on the think- tank’s website Monday.
The institute’s Mark Thirlwell said the qualitative analysis was not absolutely serious and came with the standard financial disclaimer that previous performance should not be taken as a guide to future performance.
JPMorgan predicts England reprising its 1966 World Cup win with victories against the Dutch in the semi-final and against Spain in the last game.
“A bold enough prediction, you might think, but actually that wasn’t what caught my eye: rather it was the call that England are forecast to win both games on penalties!” Thirlwell said.
England are as renowned for losing on penalties as Germany is for winning from the spot.
Goldman Sachs, another New York-based finance house, went with favourites Brazil to win the July 11 final. It stuck its neck out, though, with predictions for the two teams that would progress from the eight groups.
It had Mexico and France graduating from Group A, Argentina and Nigeria from B, England and the US from C, Germany and another team from D, Brazil and Portugal from G and Spain and Switzerland from H.
There was no explanation why there was only one pick from Group D and why Australia, Serbia or Ghana didn’t get the nod.
“We would point out that those annoyed and irritated by our selections that we did name three of the four semi-finalists in 2006 and 1998,” Goldan Sachs’ Jim O’Neill said.
In its 45-page note to clients, UBS played safe and predicted Brazil would win again – but would not say against whom or who else made up the semi-finalists.
“One needs to be humble about the predictive power of one’s models,” UBS said. “Given our experience, we have decided not to go down the perilous path of predicting a likely outcome for the whole World Cup.”
False modesty, perhaps. UBS picked Italy as the winner of the last World Cup and their prognosis was spot on.