Jean-Louis Mourier, coresponsable de la recherche économique & stratégie chez Aurel BGC

Catherine Garrigues, responsable de la gestion actions européennes chez Allianz Global Investors France

Tudor BVI, the flagship hedge fund from Tudor Investment, which suspended redemptions at the end of November, will redeem a part of investors’ money to those who request it at the end of January, two months earlier than expected, the fund has announced in a letter to clients, obtained by the Financial Times. The redemptions represent a sum of USD1.4bn, out of total assets of USD10bn.

Martin Gafner, a representative on the board of directors and chief executive officer at Investas AG, will on 15 March become CEO of Valiant Banque Privée. He will replace Marco Durrer, who is leaving Valiant ?by mutual agreement,? as is board member Thomas Lötscher. As a part of the reshuffle, the independent consulting and wealth management firm Investas (350 clients, CHF400m in assets under management) will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Valiant Banque Privée, though it will retain its name.

Le Temps reports that the private bank Syz & Co had acquired shares in the Irish-registered Sicav Thema International Fund, one of the vehicles linked to the New York fraudster Bernard Madoff, on behalf of its clients. ?Syz & Co had invested several tens of millions of francs in the fund for clients of its centralised management unit,? the newspaper reports. The private bank had informed its clients, whom it is planning to reimburse, Le Temps states.

The Dubai Multi Commodities Centre Authority and Shariah Capital have launched the Dubai Shariah Hedge Fund Index, which they call the first globally recognised index to include exclusively hedge funds which comply with Shariah law, Hedge Week reports. The product replicates the performance of the evenly-weighted fund of funds DSAM Kauthar Commodity Fund, and will be calculated and published by Thomson Reuters.

The Ramius Fund of Funds group has appointed Stuart Davies as managing director and chief investment officer, effective 20 January 2009, Hedge Week reports. He will also be a member of the investment management committee at the group. He replaces Thomas W. Strauss, who will remain as CEO of the Ramius Fund of Funds Group and also a member of the board. Davies previously held a similar position at Ivy Asset Management in New York.

Managers will toughen the liquidity terms of their new products, but promoters are likely to remain flexible to keep up with competition, Ignites Europe estimates on 8 January. ?This phenomenon has already begun for funds of hedge funds, but it will increasingly affect real estate funds, credit funds, and others,? says Aymeric Poizot, an analyst at Fitch Ratings.

Nasdaq OMX Group Inc. is launching a range of trading and investment products which focus on companies receiving government support during the financial crisis, the Wall Street Journal reports. The first product in the range is the Government Relief Index (GRI), which will track shares in 24 companies which have received more than USD1bn each in aid from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) or other assistance mechanisms. The index will measure the perormance of these companies and the effectiveness of the aid plan.

FinancialNews Online reports on 8 January that Henderson Global Investors has closed the activist fund which it launched two years ago, following the departure of its manager, John Havranek, for Hermes.

Germany’s Union Investment Real Estate (UIRE) has announced that it has acquired the ?green? office building Solaris in Vienna (about 9,000 square metres) from S+B Gruppe, though it has not disclosed the purchase price. The property, completed in September 2008, will be added to the portfolio of the open-ended real estate fund UniImmo: Deutschland. The property is already 90% leased, and the vendor will provide a three-year guarantee on rental of the remaining space.UIRE has recently announced the acquisition of another property for UniImmo: Deutschland (see Newsmanagers of 6 January), in Madrid.

The United Nations Joint Staff Pension Fund (UNJSPF) has launched a call for tenders to select a consultant for investments in funds of hedge funds and private equity. IPE reports that it is also seeking experienced managers in the area of alternative and bond investments. Meanwhile, the fund is also planning to enlarge its real estate portfolio to include infrastructure, agricultural land and forests.The UN pension fund, whose assets total about USD30bn, is also seeking a single master record keeper to replace the current global custodian, and who would also assume centralised control of reporting and administration, while cooperating with several regional custodians recruited within a number of separate mandates.

Bernard Madoff ordered his UK company to transfer about USD150m to his US firm just weeks before he confessed to running a fraud scheme, two former employees of Madoff Securities International said, according to the Financial Times. Mr Madoff explained that he was nervous about sterling.

In its 9 January issue, Il Sole - 24 Ore reports on EUR140bn in outflows from mutual funds on sale in Italy in 2008. The daily newspaper states that the leading management firm in the sector, Intesa Sanpaolo, saw net redemptions of EUR33bn in the 12-month period, while Pioneer Investments (UniCredit) saw outflows of EUR32.8bn. Other management firms which have lost assets are Banco Popolare (-EUR9.2bn), Crédit Agricole A.M. (-EUR8bn), Arca (-EUR5.8bn), Mps (-EUR5.5bn) and Ubi (-EUR5.1bn). Firms which posted positive net inflows are rare: Mediolanum (EUR891m), Generali (EUR242m), State Street Global investors (EUR280m), Banca Finnat Euroamerica (EUR273m), Agora, Pfm, and Rothschild.

In 2008, mutual funds on sale in Italy underwent net redemptions of EUR140bn, according to statistics from Assogestioni (the Italian association of management professionals). In 2007, these funds saw outflows of EUR50bn, in an atmosphere of skepticism about these products on the part of investors. The financial crisis has only aggravated the situation. Assets fell to a total of EUR409bn at the end of December.The category of funds which suffered most in 2008 was bond mutual funds, which saw outflows of EUR66bn, bringing total assets in these funds to EUR160bn. Equities mutual funds were not spared, with EUR29bn in net redemptions, bringing total assets to EUR70bn. Hedge funds saw net outflows of EUR8bn in the 12-month period, bringing assets to EUR21.5bn. In the month of December alone, this category lost slightly over EUR2bn, following a similar level of outflows in November.In December, net outflows represented slightly less than EUR9bn (nearly the same amount as in November), and aside from hedge funds, primarily affected bond funds (EUR2.8bn) and money market funds (EUR2.1bn).

Patrick Savadoux has joined Mandarine Gestion, the asset management company launched nearly a year ago by Marc Renaud, as a shareholder and equities manager. He will develop the firm’s product range in SRI (socially responsible investment), his area of expertise. Savadoux spent 15 years at Natixis Asset Management as a senior European equities portfolio manager and head of the SRI unit. In November 2007, he left the firm along with Stéphane Prévost to create La Financière Responsable, an asset management company specialised in SRI and partly owned by La Française des Placements. He left that firm one year later to pursue a project outside of finance, which was not ultimately successful.Savadoux’s first fund at Mandarine Gestion will be launched in January. It will invest in Euro zone equities following an SRI approach developed by the manager over the course of his career. The manager will rely on Vigeo, and is hoping to subsequently establish internal SRI research resources. Other products may follow, including thematic or solidaristic SRI funds.With the new addition, Mandarine increases its team of specialised managers and its product offerings, which already include value management, convertible bond management, and French equities management. The firm manages assets of EUR300m.

The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports that Stefan Zuschke, head of BC Partners for Germany, has announced that business in the portfolio of the British private equity investment firm earned an EBITDA margin in 2008 of 8.5%, and that the only problem case is the London-based broker and realtor Foxton, which represents only 1% of the firm’s total investments. BC Partners has no financing problems either, and its 120 fund lessors have honoured their deadlines in the past two acquisitions. BC Partners is not planning to launch any new funds until next year.

According to sources close to the firm, the private equity division of Lehman Brothers, Lehman Brothers Merchant Banking, will become an independent firm with a portfolio of USD4.5bn invested in a dozen companies, the Wall Street Journal reports. Lehman will retain a large interest in the new affiliate, in which the South African billionaire Johann Rupert (president of Richemont) will invest USD250m via his Luxembourg investment vehicle Reinet Investments SCA.

Rab Captial, New Star Asset Management, Man Group, Marwyn Value Investors, Fortress, Citadel and Boussard & Gavaudan may be the next targets of activist hedge funds, since their share prices have fallen in the past few weeks, Il Sole- 24 Ore predicts on 9 January. These publicly traded management firms make ideal targets, since the difference between their capitalisation and their assets can easily be calculated, the Italian newspaper adds.

The Madoff fraud scandal may cost HSBC at least EUR1.6bn, and UBS as much as EUR1.4bn, as they were the depositary banks for some funds invested in the US giant, Il Sole - 24 Ore reports on 9 January. These amounts represent each bank’s exposure. HSBC and UBS make attractive targets for lawyers representing managers and investors who lost money in the Madoff fraud, who are aware that neither Madoff’s liquidators, nor the funds which fed into Madoff, now have sufficient financial solidity to pay off all the losses, the Italian newspaper remarks.

The British Serious Fraud Office announced on Thursday that it has opened a major investigation into fraud by Bernard Madoff, after receiving a preliminary report from Grant Thornton, the Financial Times reports. The SFO will focus particularly on the activities of Madoff’s British firm.

The United States federal prosecutor’s office has announced that investigators who searched the office of Bernard Madoff after his arrest on 11 December found about 100 signed cheques representing a total of more than USD173m, the Wall Street Journal reports. The revelation comes as the court hears a motion to remove the suspect from house arrest and return him to full incarceration. The cheques were ready to be sent out.

Axel Schroeder, chairman of the board at MPC Capital, has announced that the wealth management and closed fund management firm will lay off 55 employees out of a total of 300, in order to achieve a configuration that will allow the firm to become profitable on net subscriptions which are limited to only EUR300m. Currently, the business is set up to handle more than EUR1bn in net inflows. MPC Capital revised its projections for net inflows in 2008 less than two months ago, down to EUR600m from EUR1.1bn (see Newsmanagers of 19 November).The cost reduction plan will also include other measures which will be announced in mid-February. The objective is to save EUR10m this year.

An internal email addressed to employees by John Thain, former CEO of Merrill Lynch, which has been obtained by Dow Jones, confirms that Dan Sontag, head of American Wealth Management, has been appointed as expected as head of the global wealth management group, replacing Robert McCann, who has resigned. Sontag thus becomes head of a brokerage division that employs 16,850.

Veritas Investment announced on Thursday that its ETF fund ETF-Dachsfonds, launched in April 2007 (see Newsmanagers of 20 March 2007) has over EUR100m in assets as of the beginning of this year, thanks to net subscriptions of EUR45m in the month of December alone. The product, which was launched at a time when Veritas was owned by Boursorama (Société Générale group), and which is still managed by Markus Kaiser, posts performance since its launch of 5.4%; in 2008, the fund earned 0.7%.

Nasdaq OMX Group Inc. lance une gamme de produits de négoce et d"investissement concernant les entreprises soutenues par le gouvernement pendant la crise financière mondiale, rapporte The Wall Street Journal. Le premier d"entre eux est le Government Relief Index (GRI), qui suivra les valeurs de 24 entreprises ayant chacune reçu plus de 1 milliard de dollars de soutien par le biais du Trouble Asset Relief Program (TARP) ou d"autres mécanismes d"aide. Il s"agit de mesurer la performance de ces entreprises et l"efficacité du plan de sauvetage.

Pour quelques fonds spécialisés, le malheur a du bon. En 2008, les fonds misant sur la volatilité des marchés financiers ont réalisé les meilleures performances.C"est notamment le cas de Centrale Long Vol, un FCP de CCR accessible aux particuliers, qui a fourni un gain de 24,6 %.Responsable du pôle volatilité de CCR, le gérant Hatem Dohni estime qu"un fonds de volatilité est la «seule assurance de portefeuille qui finit par bien réagir quand les actions baissent». Centrale Long Vol a pour objectif d"offrir une exposition positive («long only») à la volatilité des marchés financiers, essentiellement celle des marchés d"actions européennes. Avec son équipe, le gérant construit son portefeuille en achetant notamment des options sur les indices actions."Dans ce cas, nous isolons seulement la composante volatilité des options, en neutralisant tous les autres risques», explique-t-il. Par ailleurs, la plage de sensibilité permise au fonds est assez élevée, puisqu"elle s"étale entre 1 et 7. Conjugué avec l"habileté des gérants à prendre des paris sur l"orientation de la volatilité, ce facteur explique la bonne performance.Cela étant, le pari a fonctionné car 2008 a été une année record pour la volatilité : la volatilité historique sur un an de l"Eurostoxx 50 s"est élevé à 40 %, contre 16 % en 2007."Mais cette année, la volatilité des actions va baisser d"un cran», juge Hatem Dohni, qui l"envisage dans une fourchette de 20 % à 30 %.La raison essentielle réside dans la baisse des taux d"intérêt et la réduction de l"effet de levier qui concerne désormais les banques comme les entreprises. «Ce cycle de deleveraging peut durer longtemps, de six mois à deux ans», pronostique le gérant de CCR.Toutefois, pour l"investisseur, le choix du moment pour acheter ou vendre ses parts dans le fonds est très important. «Attendez un peu que la volatilité baisse pour entrer dans le fonds», recommande d"ailleurs Hatem Dohni.Ce type de fonds doit en effet être choisi moins pour l"espoir de gain que pour couvrir le risque d"une poche d"actions. On peut envisager un investissement correspondant à un cinquième de celle-ci dans une allocation d"actifs. Comme outil d"assurance de portefeuille, ce type de fonds est en effet peu coûteux. Et c"est ainsi que l"utilisent les clients investisseurs institutionnels, ce qui peut inspirer aussi les particuliers et leurs conseillers.

Rab Capital, New Star Asset Management, Man Group, Marwyn Value Investors, Fortress, Citadel et Boussard & Gavaudan pourraient être les prochaines cibles des hedge funds activists après les chutes de cours de ces dernières semaines, estime Il Sole ? 24 Ore du 9 janvier. Les sociétés de gestion cotées sont des cibles idéales car la différence entre la capitalisation et les encours peut être facilement calculée, ajoute le quotidien italien.

Pour Vincent Chaigneau, responsable de la stratégie taux et change chez SG CIB à Londres, un krach sur la dette souveraine est peu probable. Toutefois, les semaines qui viennent auront valeur de test.Newsmanagers : Y a-t-il un risque de voir les investisseurs bouder la dette souveraine comme cela a récemment été le cas en pour le bund allemand ?Vincent Chaigneau: L"accueil réservé aux bunds allemand a été décevant, il est vrai, mais c"est aussi dû à un problème de valeur relative. De façon générale, on observe néanmoins une explosion des émissions gouvernementales, notamment aux Etats-Unis, ou 2.200 USD milliards, soit l"équivalent de 15 % du PIB, seront lancés.En Europe, le montant devrait se situer autour de 750 milliards d"euros. Cela fait beaucoup de papier à absorber.NM : Précisément, le marché peut-il tout absorber ?VC : Le marché devrait tout absorber mais le tout est de savoir à quel prix. Le seul problème qui pourrait se poser est que les investisseurs se mettent à douter de la solidité des Etats.Certains signes donnent ce sentiment si on se réfère à certains CDS de la dette sur Etat, comme pour l"Irlande et la Grèce. Pour la Grèce, on est passé de 50 à 215 PB avec une crête de 250 atteinte en décembre 2009. Pour l"Irlande, on est passé de 30 PB à 175 après avoir culminé à 235.NM : Peut-on voir le rating des grands Etats revu à la baisse ?VC : Je ne pense pas que le rating des grands Etats baisse. Des pays comme les USA, la France, ou l"Allemagne conserveront leur rating AAA.Les agences de rating déplorent la forte hausse des engagements des Etats (par exemple aux Etats-Unis, via la mise sous tutelle de Freddie Mac et Fannie Mae) mais pour l"heure ne menacent pas de changer les notations.Le niveau de la dette/PIB aux Etats-Unis est, par exemple, aujourd"hui de l"ordre de 60 %, soit un niveau bien moindre que celui atteint par le Japon, après la forte dégradation des années quatre-vingt et quatre-vingt dix.La dette japonaise n"a été abaissée qu"en 2002, alors que sa dette publique atteignait quelque 150 % du PIB.NM : Y a- t-il des tests qui vont donner l"état du marché obligataire dans les jours qui viennent ?VC : Janvier est un mois de plein rush. La semaine prochaine, il y aura notamment beaucoup d"émissions de dettes gouvernementales ou garanties par les Etats qui seront intéressantes à suivre.Les émissions de schatz allemand et de BTP 5 ans le 14 janvier marqueront aussi une étape assez décisive.NM : Beaucoup estiment que le faible rendement des emprunts d"Etat pourrait redonner du lustre aux corporates. Est-ce votre avis ?VC : Beaucoup de monde parle actuellement de bulle obligataire, mais ce n"est pas notre avis.Les rendements sont, certes, assez faibles mais les investisseurs qui font ce type de scenarii oublient certaines données comme, par exemple, le risque de déflation ou encore le fait que le Trésor va se porter acquéreur de beaucoup de MBS, voire de Treasuries.Il y a actuellement beaucoup de cash qui cherche à s"investir ; la recherche de rendements peut bénéficier aux actifs risqués en tout début d"année alors que les portefeuilles sont déployés, mais sur une perspectives 6 mois la situation conjoncturelle déplorable, susceptible d"entretenir l"instabilité financière, n"incite pas à la prise de risque.NM : Quel est votre pronostic sur le dollar/euro ?VC : Notre pronostic initial était de 1,15 pour la fin du premier trimestre, et nous allons le ramener à 1,20-25. Mais, à moyen terme, je suis pessimiste sur l"évolution du dollar.Pour que les investisseurs étrangers se portent acquéreurs des émissions massives de Treasuries, il faudra soit des rendements obligataires plus élevés (improbable) soit un dollar plus faible. Le billet vert pourrait lourdement rechuter sur les 6-9 derniers mois de l"année.

Dans son édition du 9 janvier, Il Sole ? 24 Ore revient sur les 140 milliards d"euros de décollecte enregistrée par les OPCVM commercialisés en Italie en 2008. Le quotidien précise que le leader du secteur, Intesa Sanpaolo, a accusé sur 12 mois des rachats nets de 33 milliards d"euros, tandis que Pioneer Investments (UniCredit) voyait s"envoler 32,8 milliards. Les autres sociétés dans le rouge sont Banco Popolare (-9,2 milliards), Crédit Agricole A.M. (-8), Arca (-5,8), Mps (-5,5) et Ubi (-5,1). Les sociétés ayant enregistré une collecte positive sont rares : Mediolanum (891 millions), Generali ( 242), State Street Global investors (280), Banca Finnat Euroamerica (273), ainsi que Agora, Pfm e Rothschild.