Le fonds souverains Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC)a racheté 10% du capital supplémentaire de Straumann à son actionnaire principal, Thomas Straumann. Cela porte à 14% la part du capital détenue par le premier fonds d’Etat de Singapour dans le fabricant d’implants dentaires, rapporte Le Temps.On estime à 5100 milliards de dollars les actifs gérés par les fonds souverains à travers le monde, selon des données de Sovereign Wealth Fund.

Petercam prépare le lancement d’un fonds ISR d’obligations émergentes libellées en devises locales, a indiqué Yves Hup, responsable commercial France et Italie.Ce nouveau fonds coordonné, qui pourrait être lancé au premier trimestre 2013, devrait obéir à une approche ISR assez stricte qui déterminera les pondérations au sein du portefeuille. La maison belge répond ainsi à l’intérêt croissant des investisseurs pour les marchés émergents et marque une nouvelle fois sa volonté d’accorder une large place à l’investissement socialement responsable dans sa gestion.

Skandia a passé un accord avec huit sociétés de gestion pour sa gamme de fonds à bas coûts qui sera lancée initialement sous la marque Select, rapporte Fund Web. Ces sociétés sont : Aberdeen, BlackRock, BNY Mellon, Fidelity, Henderson, JP Morgan, Schroders et Threadneedle. Skandia a refusé de dévoiler le détail des arrangements en termes de prix. A terme, l’offre devrait inclure 12 sociétés de gestion.

Grâce à la vente récente de plusieurs actifs, le fonds immobilier offert au public DEGI International d’Aberdeen Immobilien KAG (DE0008007998, 1.366,4 millions d’euros d’encours), qui se trouve en liquidation, peut distribuer environ 70 millions d’euros à ses quelque 70.000 porteurs, rapporte la Börsen-Zeitung.

Hans Joachim Reinke, président du directoire d’Union Investment, annonce dans un entretien avec la Börsen-Zeitung que, pour faire face aux défis structurels et réglementaires, le gestionnaire central des banques populaires allemandes lance un programme de réduction de coûts et d’augmentation des revenus.D’ici à 2015, les charges de personnel et les frais généraux doivent baisser de 10 % par rapport aux 585 millions d’euros actuels, ce qui va entrainer la suppression d’environ un dixième des 2.400 emplois actuels.Cette réduction d’effectifs se fera de manière «socialement supportable» et «si possible sans licenciements secs».D’autre part, le développement de l’immobilier doit générer 30 millions d’euros de recettes supplémentaires. En 2012, Union Investment a évolué de manière très positive et meilleure que prévu aussi bien en ce qui concerne les souscriptions que sa situation bénéficiaire.

Après un plongeon de 45,5 % en glissement annuel à 340,7 millions d’euros pour la période de janvier à septembre 2011, le bénéfice économique (bénéfice aux normes IFRS avant impôt plus résultat de la valorisation des instruments financiers) de Deka affiche pour les neuf premiers mois de 2012 un gonflement de 30,6 % à 444,9 millions d’euros.Le gestionnaire central des caisses d'épargne allemandes s’attend à une «sensible» augmentation de son résultat pour l’ensemble de 2012, après un effondrement de 58,6 % à 383,1 millions d’euros l’an dernier.Grâce à l’effet de marché, les encours ont augmenté à 154,3 milliards d’euros au 30 septembre, contre 151 milliards fin décembre et à 142,63 milliards fin septembre 2011. Deka accuse en effet pour les neuf premiers mois de 2012, des sorties nettes de 2.188 millions d’euros contre 5.338 millions pour la période correspondante de l’an dernier. Néanmoins, la collecte nette de ses fonds immobiliers est ressortie à 1,4 milliard d’euros contre 0,7 milliards un an plus tôt. Les fonds de valeurs mobilières ont subi des remboursements nets de 3,6 milliards d’euros contre 6 milliards douze mois auparavant. La plate-forme patrimoniale Deka-Vermögenskonzept a enregistré des rentrées nettes de 1,2 milliard d’euros et la formule Deka-Basisanlage lancée cette année a attiré 200 millions d’euros à fin septembre.

Le 23 novembre, DWS a servi aux porteurs du fonds DWS Top Dividende un montant de 2,75 euros par part, ce qui représente plus de 274 millions d’euros, indique le gestionnaire allemand. C’est une distribution record pour un fonds DWS.Les fonds DWS Top Dividende et DWS Invest Top Dividend, dont l’encours a dépassé les 10 milliards d’euros courant septembre, ont enregistré depuis le début de l’année des souscriptions nettes de 2,5 milliards d’euros.

La politique d’investissement du RRUQ (2,5 milliards de dollars canadiens) se distingue par un recours systématique à la gestion active et par la place importante accordée aux thématiques d’investissement alternatives. Les placements privés/infrastructures (9 %), l’immobilier (7,5 %), les autres placements alternatifs (4 %) et les matières premières (3 %) représentent près d’un quart de l’allocation stratégique, contre 32 % pour les titres à revenus fixes, 19,5 % pour les actions canadiennes et 25 % pour les actions étrangères. Le portefeuille de titres à revenu fixe est presque intégralement exposé au marché domestique. La diversification internationale est laissée à la discrétion des gérants et ne fait pas l’objet de mandats spécifiques à l’exception d’un mandat en dette émergente, dont l’objectif est d’apporter un rendement absolu additionnel par rapport à la courbe des taux canadienne. En revanche, le poids des marchés étrangers dans les investissements en actions augmente de façon tendancielle au détriment des actions domestiques. « Depuis 2008, l’ensemble des investissements sur les marchés actions étrangers ont été regroupés en une seule ligne d’actions mondiales avec comme indice de référence le MSCI ACWI ex-Canada. L'équipe de placement, avec l’accord du comité de placement, détermine ensuite l’exposition aux différents marchés sous-jacents », explique Normand Belley, conseiller senior en placement au RRUQ. Le portefeuille d’actions étrangères se compose de mandats exposés aux grandes et petites capitalisations américaines et internationales, de deux mandats investis sur les marchés émergents, et d’un mandat d’actions mondiales. La prochaine révision de la politique de placement pourrait faire la part belle aux mandats d’actions mondiales, au dépend de l’exposition régionale aux marchés américain et européens (EAFE). Plutôt que d’opérer une gestion des investissements en interne, les équipes du RRUQ se concentrent sur la définition de la politique de placement ainsi que sur la sélection de gérants, celle-ci résultant d’un croisement entre une recherche multicritère et les informations accumulées au fil du temps. Le régime n’hésite pas à solliciter des expertises en dehors de son marché domestique.

The European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) on 27 November placed a EUR7 billion one-year benchmark bond maturing on 3 December 2013, at an average rate of 0.22%. Earlier in the day, the EFSF expressed an intention to issue one-year bonds “in the near future” to resolve its temporary inability to make use of mid- and long-term issues since the credit rating of France was downgraded by Moody’s. “This inaugural one-year bond from EFSF was met with exceptionally strong demand with close to EUR9 billion in orders received from investors around the world,” the fund says in a statement. The EFSF had been planning to issue three-year bonds last week, but was obliged to call off the plans at the last minute due to the ratings downgrade for France the evening before by the ratings agency Moody’s, from Aaa to Aa1. The FESF rating depends on the ratings of the euro zone member states which guarantee its lending. The rating for these guarantor states has to be equal to or higher than its own long-term rating, from each ratings agency, and hence the temporary inability caused by Moody’s ratings downgrade of France. Christophe Frankel, CFO and Deputy CEO of EFSF stated “Today’s one-year bond has allowed us not only to complete the remaining EUR3.6 billion from this year’s funding programme but also to gain a head start for 2013”.

Russ Koesterich has barely been appointed as chief investment strategist at BlackRock, and Nuveen Investments (USD220bn in assets as of 30 September) has announced that its affiliate Nuveen Asset Management (USD117bn) has recruited Koesterich’s predecessor, Bob Doll, as chief equity strategist and senior portfolio manager, effective from 26 November.Doll, who announced his departure from BlackRock in June, reports to David Chalupnik, head of equities at Nuveen Asset Management. He will reinforce the capacities of Nuveen AM in the area of multi-asset.

The Swedish investment fund association Fondbolagens Förening has published a book on responsible investment, at a time when climate talks are beginning in Doha. A survey by TNS Sifo Prospera of 1,600 Swedes aged between 18 and 79 finds that they place a high importance on the “responsible” product ranges from asset management firms. On a scale of 1 (not important) to 5 (very important), this aspect receives an average of 4. SRI is more popular with women (4.3) than men (3.7).

UBS Global Asset Management has appointed Thomas Wels as head of its global real estate business, Investment Week reports. Wels has been working at the firm since 2005, most recently as COO of the executive board. He replaces Paul Marcuse, who is leaving UBS.

Management fees for funds from the Belgian-registered funds Petercam Equities Europe, Euroland and Europe Sustainable funds on 26 November increased to 1.50% from 1.25% previously, while the Petercam Bonds EUR was increased to 0.50% from 0.30%. Management fees for institutional share classes have increased to 0.75% from 0.62% and 0.40% from 0.30%, respectively.The Belgian asset management firm says that “the goal is to globalise costs inherent to management over all fees, and to limit the impact on TER, which remains the indicator par excellence of fund pricing, to a minimum.”

Deutsche Bank has added a second fund from the Swedish firm Coeli to its dbSelect platform, which provides access to liquid hedge fund strategies, Investment Europe reports. The new fund is the Coeli Spektrum, which has USD110m in assets under management, and has earned 13.6% annualised performance over the past three years.

The British firm Schroders on 27 November announced the launch on 7 November of the RMB Fixed Income sub-fund of its SISF Sicav (Schroder International Selection Fund), which allows foreign investors access to the bond market denominated in Chinese offshore currency (Hong Kong).The fund is actively-managed, and uses the RMB Investment Grade Bond Total Return Index as its benchmark. Management is provided by the Asian fixed income team led by Rajeev De Mello and Angus Hui.The objective is to construct a diversified portfolio of Chinese government bonds and Chinese and foreign investment grade corporate bonds denominated in yuan.CharacteristicsSchroder ISF RMB Fixed Income EUR Parts A Capitalisation (acc) in euros ISIN code: LU0845699254Management fee: 0.75%Schroder ISF RMB Fixed Income Parts A capitalisation (acc) in CNYISIN code: LU0845698876Management fee: 0.75%

The Italian pension fund for medical professionals, Enpam, which has EUR12.5bn in assets under management, will gradually reduce its investments in real estate, Citywire Global reports. The fund will not be selling its current investments in real estate, but it will not be investing more.

Cross-border IPOs represented 9% (1,172) of the total number of operations, and 13% (USD220bn) of the total amount raised worldwide between 2002 and 2011, according to a study recently published by PwC and Baker McKenzie, entitled “Equity sans frontières: Trends in cross-border IPOs.” The past ten years have been marked by an increase in the number of Asian businesses undertaking cross-border IPOs. Businesses in Asia-Pacific make the most cross-border IPOs. China ranks first, with 347 cross-border operations, of which 39% were in the United States. Singapore is a major regional centre for cross-border IPOs, with most issuers from continental China (71% of operations hosted in Singapore, 130 issuers, raising USD5bn), or Hong Kong (14%, 26 issuers, USD6bn raised). Although Paris places in the top 10, London is the main destination for cross-border IPOs (480 cross-border issuers from markets worldwide held IPOs there, totalling USD110bn raised). These figures represent 34% of the volume, and 15% of the value of IPOs on the London Stock Exchange, and 38% in volume and 50% in value of cross-border operations worldwide. New York is the second destination for foreign issuers, with 264 IPOs totalling USD56bn raised. More than half of foreign firms which held IPOs in the United States (51%, 134 issuers) were from China, totalling USD20bn raised. Several of these operations were backdoor listings (acquisition of a public company by a private company).

Due to the recent sale of several properties, the open-ended real estate fund DEGI International from Aberdeen Immobilien KAG (DE0008007998, EUR1.3364bn in assets), which is in liquidation, will be able to distribute about EUR70m to its approximately 70,000 shareholders, the Börsen-Zeitung reports.

On 23 November, DWS paid EUR2.75 per share to shareholders in the DWS Top Dividende fund, which represents over EUR274m, the German asset management firm says. This is a record payout for a DWS fund.The DWS Top Dividende and DWS Invest Top Dividend funds, whose assets topped EUR10bn in September, have posted net subscriptions of EUR2.5bn YTD.

In these difficult times, a growing number of investors are insisting on meeting the heads of businesses before buying a stake – which leaves the directors less time to run their businesses, the Wall Street Journal explains. This trend is not likely to stop. In a study which has not yet been published, Eugene Soltes, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School, shows that investors who met the CEO of a mid-sized US business between 2004 and 2010 more frequently tended to make better investments.

SAC Capital will hold a telephone meeting with investors on Wednesday in order to respond to concerns in relation to ties of the hedge fund’s which the US authorities are calling the largest insider trading scandal ever, the Financial Times reports, citing sources familiar with the matter. The US authorities claim that SAC avoided USD194 in losses and made gains of USD83m on bets against the prices of the pharmaceutical companies Wyatt and Elan ahead of the results of tests of Alzheimer medications. The meeting will be held before the US markets open.

Currently (as of 31 October), Acropole Asset Management has assets of about EUR750m, of which about EUR150m are in mandates. Assets under management have increased by about 20% since the beginning of the year, half of this due to market appreciation, and half to net subscriptions, Emmanuel Martin, CIO, said on Tuesday.The FCP Acropole Global High Yield (150 positions), launched on 13 July 2010, which is currently 57% invested in convertible high yield bonds, has assets of EUR51bn, and has posted inflows of about EUR10bn since the beginning of 2012.

Teresa Watkins has left Comgest, where she spent nearly ten years, Citywire Global reports. She had been manager of the Comgest Growth Mid Caps Europe, a fund with EUR22.6m.

The Board of the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) published on November 27 the Final Report on Principles for Ongoing Disclosure for Asset Backed Securities (ABS Ongoing Disclosure Principles), which contains principles designed to provide guidance to securities regulators who are developing or reviewing their regulatory regimes for ongoing disclosure for asset-backed securities (ABS).The objective of the ABS Ongoing Disclosure Principles is to enhance investor protection by facilitating a better understanding of the issues that should be considered by regulators in relation to ongoing disclosure regimes for ABS.

The head of the China Investment Corporation (CIC), Jin Liquin, is not mincing his words. The new regulations imposed by the United States and Europe are the largest threat to global growth, according to claims reported by Asian Investor. “Over-regulation and inappropriate interventions are the largest risks to the global recovery, which threaten the effective functioning of the financial system,” he said at an international conference held in Mumbai. “In the United States and Europe, over-regulation is widespread. In every sector, excessive regulation is an obstacle to economic development, in the same way that excessive taxation is destructive.” This increase in regulation will discourage investment, the CIC head says. The fund has assets under management of about USD410bn.

BlackRock has recruited the team consisting of Philippe Benaroya, Chris Wrenn and Gilles Lengaigne to launch an affiliate in London to invest in European infrastructure debt, Agefi reports. The team will focus initially on the needs of financial sector investors such as insurance groups.

Petercam is preparing to launch an SRI fund of emerging market bonds denominated in local currencies, Yves Huo, head of sales for France and Italy, has announced. The new UCITS-compliant fund, which could be launched in first quarter 2013, would follow a rather strict SRI approach, which would determine the size of stakes in the portfolio. The Belgian asset management firm is responding to growing interest on the part of investors in emerging markets, and once again markets its desire to grant a larger presence to socially responsible management.

Global emerging market funds have seen inflows in October totalling a net GBP228m, the best inflows for any month, according to statistics from the British investment management association (IMA). These are followed by UK Equity Income strategies (net inflows of GBP172m), £ Strategic Bond (GBP147m), Mixed Investment Shares 20-60% (GBP146m) and Global Equity Income (GBP132m). Globally, net inflows totalled GBP924m in October, compared with GBP655m the previous month. For the second consecutive month, equities top the asset classes, with net inflows of GBP550m, followed by bonds (GBP336m).

Skandia has signed an agreement with eight asset management firms for its low-cost fund range, which will initially be launched under the Select brand name, Fund Web reports. The firms are: Aberdeen, BlackRock, BNY Mellon, Fidelity, Henderson, JP Morgan, Schroders and Threadneedle. Skandia has declined to disclose details about the price terms. Eventually, the range is expected to include 12 asset management firms.

Following a 45.5% decline year on year to EUR340.7m in January-September 2011, economic profits (profits according to IFRS accounting standards before taxes, plus the results of valuation of financial instruments) at Deka in the first nine months of 2012 were up 30.6%, to EUR444.9m.The central asset management firm for the German savings banks is predicting a “noticeable’ increase in its profits for the year 2012 overall, following a 58.6% decline to EUR383.1m last year.Due to market appreciation, assets increased to EUR154.3bn as of 30 September, compared with EUR151bn as of the end of December, and EUR142.63bn as of the end of September 2011.Deka has seen net outflows in the first nine months of 2012 of EUR2.188bn, compared with EUR5.338bn in the corresponding period of last year. However, net inflows to real estate funds totalled EUR1.5bn, compared with EUR0.7bn. Securities funds have seen net outflows of EUR3.6bn, compared with EUR6bn, but the wealth-management platform Deka-Vermögenskonzept has seen net inflows of EUR1.2bn, and the Deka-Basisanlage formula, launched this year, attracted EUR200m as of the end of September.