Christian Pierotti on 2 January joined the French Federation of Insurance Companies (FFSA), and will become responsible for the Office of European and International Affairs. Pierotti will report to President Bernard Spitz and Director General Jean-François Lequoy, and will be responsible for the development of the FFSA office in Brussels and of relationships with European and international interlocutors of the Federation, the FFSA says in a statement. Pierotti previously served as vice president for Public and Regulatory Affairs at AEGON NV, after serving from 2005 to 2008 as Director of Government Affairs for Europe at PMI Mortgage Insurance Limited. Pierotti had previously been Director of International Affairs and Institutional Relationships for the European Insurance Committee (CEA), beginning in 1999.

MidAmerican Energy, a company dedicated to the energy projects of the US investor Warren Buffett, will spend USD2bn to USD2.5nb to invest in solar projects in California, which will be constructed and operated by SunPower, 66% owned by the French firm Total, Les Echos reports.

2012 was a vintage year for shareholder activism in the United States, the Financial Times reports. Many activists successfully put pressure on companies to make them distribute dividends or make operations, and several large companies, such as P&G, were genuinely besieged. At the same time, with returns of more than 20% per year in some cases, activist funds saw a wave of subscriptions. At the end of third quarter, USD57bn had been dedicated to activist strategies, compared with USD51bn at the end of last year, and USD32bn at the end of 2008, HFR reports.

DoubleLine Capital LP recruits Brendt Stallings and Husam Nazer as the firm expands its product line-up into equity investment strategies. They join as portfolio managers and partners in DoubleLine Equity LP, a newly created affiliate of DoubleLine.Stallings and Nazer were previously group managing directors at TCW, the highest title for investment managers at the firm. There they managed USD5 billion invested in common stocks in several successful strategies, which were both broadly invested and sectorfocused. DoubleLine CEO Jeffrey Gundlach, who previously served as chief investment officer of TCW and headed that firm’s largest investment group, launched DoubleLine in December 2009 with more than 40 of his former colleagues. Today DoubleLine employs more than 80 people, is majority-owned by its employees and manages more than USD53 billion in asset allocation, bond and now stock strategies.

The Vice Fund from USA Mutuals, which invests in companies active in tobacco, alcohol, gambling and weapons, knows no crisis, Fondionline reports. It finished the year 2012 with gains of 21.49% (as of 18 December), beating the Standard & Poor’s index by nearly four points. The two largest positions of the fund are two tobacco companies: Altria and Lorillard.

Dalton Strategic Partners has appointed Nabeel Mughal, a former Henderson analyst, as lead manager of its North American equity strategy, Citywire Global reports. The appointment follows the departure of Peter Kaye, who left the fund last month, and is expected to join Fidelity in first quarter 2013. Mughal joined Dalton in 2009.

In the final days of 2012, emerging markets equity funds were the only category to post significant inflows. In the week ending on 26 December, global and Asia ex Japan emerging market equity funds both earned net inflows of about USD1bn, according to EPFR Global. Equity Funds absorbed USD3.6 billion as retail investors again refused to chase gains, especially in developed markets. Outside the fixed income universe, Mexico, Colombia and Philippines Equity, Long/Short, Derivatives, Real Estate and Healthcare/Biotechnology Sector and Dividend Equity Funds also posted record inflows while Canada, UK, France, Germany and Taiwan Equity Funds set new outflow marks. EPFR Global-tracked Bond Funds, which averaged net inflows of USD9 billion a week on their way to a new full year inflow record, took in only USD419 million during the week ending December 26. But for the year as a whole, several categories will set new records, including US, High Yield, Emerging Markets, Mortgage Backed, Canada and Australia Bond Funds.

A Lyxor ETF investing in Italian government short-term bonds, Lyxor ETF MTS BTP 1-3Y Italy Government Bond, has topped EUR100m in assets, Bluerating reports. It was launched on 14 November 2012 on the Italian stock exchange, and on 17 December on Euronext.

The Eurekahedge index gained 1% in December, bringing its performance for the year as a whole to 5.63%. The MSCI World index in December gained 2.28%, and for the year as a whole shows gains of 13.75%. The largest gains were for funds dedicated to emerging markets, with gains of 11.2% for Latin America funds, and for distressed debt funds (12.2%), followed by hedge funds specialised in fixed income and relative value strategies, which also posted double-digit returns. Hedge fund assets last year increased by USD75bn, to USD1.78trn as of the end of the year. Net inflows totalled only USD19bn. New hedge fund creations last year slowed to 959, at a time when there were 860 closures, a level not seen since the outbreak of the financial crisis.

OCM Wealth Management is launching a discretionary asset management platform for independent financial advisers, Money Marketing reports. Platform Plus will unit 15 British providers, including Provident International, Curtis Bank and Aegon.

The Italian asset management firm Anima, va its parent company Asset Management Holding (AMH), has completed its acquisition of the asset management activities of the Italian bank Credito Valtellinese (Creval), representing assets of EUR2.5bn, plus EUR600m in third-party products. The operation was announced in August. AMH, which has EUR35bn in assets under management as of the end of June 2012, has acquired all capital in Aperta, the asset management firm of Creval, and its 70% stake in LuxGuest, its Luxembourg asset management firm, for a total of EUR33m (EUR27m for Aperta and EUR6m for LuxGuest). Creval has also subscribed to a capital increase reserved for AMH for EUR16m, which will allow it to acquire 2.8% of capital. The operation allows Credito Valtellinese to outsource its asset management activities, while AMH, via Anima, strengthens its assets under management and pursues its strategy to become a key asset management partner of banks. The firm already works for Monte dei Paschi di Siena and Banca Popolare di Milano, who are among its largest shareholders, and who created the firm along with the private equity firm Clessidra.

Henderson Global Invetors has lost the management contract for its Asian Growth trust, with GBP286m in assets, to Schroders, Investment Week reports. The trust had been managed by Andrew Beal at Henderson since September 2005, but in the past few years performance had been patchy. The vehicle will now be managed by Robin Parbrook and King Fuei, both based in Hong Kong. They already manage the Schroder ISF Asia Total Return fund.

The CEO of Winton Capital Management, Anthony Daniell, will resign this new year, Financial News can reveal. However, he will remain at the hedge fund firm. Tony Fenner-Leitao will replace him as CEO.

Investors continued to place their money in European funds in November, placing EUR27.6bn in long-term funds, according to statistics compiled by Morningstar. Subscriptions since the beginning of the year total EUR174.6m in the first 11 months of 2012 for open-ended funds (excluding money markets). Investors’ interest in returns has not let up. In November, subscriptions to bond funds totalled EUR19.9bn, the second-highest level of inflows for these funds since Morningstar began publishing data of this type (2007). In the first 11 months of the year 2012, investors placed EUR158m in bond funds, compared with inflows of EUR96.5m in 2010. Although bond funds continue to dominate, investors in equity funds made a comeback, with EUR4.74bn in inflows in November for funds in this asset class. The Morningstar global emerging markets, mixed international equities, and international value large cap equities categories posted the strongest inflows, while French and euro zone equities were the most unpopular. In the first 11 months of the year, equity funds remain in negative territory, with net redemptions of EUR11.05bn. Allocation funds remain popular. They have posted net inflows of EUR3.1bn in November, and EUR25bn since the beginning of 2012. In the rankings of asset management firms with the largest inflows, the bond specialist PIMCO comes out on top, with net subscriptions of EUR28.74bn in November, more than twice the level of the second-place asset management firm, Alliance Bernstein (EUR11.95bn). They are followed by Axa (EUR7.8bn), M&G (EUR8.42bn), and Credit Suisse (EUR7.57bn). “Only two of the 10 largest asset management firms by inflows since the beginning of the year did not stand out for the popularity of their bond funds: Aberdeen was the largest beneficiary of an interest in emerging market equities, while M&G profited from the popularity of allocation funds,” Morningstar notes. The full study is attached (PDF).

The Geneva-based consulting firm Blue Lakes Advisors has signed a representation agreement with Paradigm Capital, a Canadian investment company specialised in Canadian capital markets, Agefi Switzerland reports. The agreement was accepted in mid-January by the Ontario Securities Commission, the Canadian supervisory authority. Blue Lakes will distribute research by Paradigm, which has a solid reputation in the natural resources sector in particular, to its institutional clients.

The Royal Bank of Canada, one of the 15 largest banks in the world and the fifth-largest in North America by market capitalisation, has joind the Swiss Structured Products Association (ASPS), Agefi Switzerland reports. The head of the structured products division for Switzerland, Stefan Hascoet, welcomes the new membership: “Switzerland is the largest market for structured products in Europe. Our membership in the ASPS is a sign of our commitment and reinforces our reputation as an established provider of structured products on this market.”

The Stability Law 2013, passed last week by the Italian parliament, excludes ethical finance from the financial transaction tax, Bluerating reports. The new regulations state that transactions related to products and services qualified as ethical or socially responsible will be exempt from the tax.

The insurer ACA Financial Guaranty Corp. has filed a lawsuit against the hedge fund company of John Paulson for allegedly inducing the company to insure part of a mortgage-linked investment that soured, the Wall Street Journal reports. The agreement at the centre of the lawsuit is a CDO entitled Abacus 2007-aCI, the same one which was cited in a lawsuit filed against Goldman by the Securities and Exchange Commission in 2010.

After a catastrophic year in 2011, emerging markets finished 2012 with growth of 15.27% for the year as a whole, while developed markets posted gains of 13.91%, according to statistics from S&P Dow Jones Indices. However, in the past two years, developed markets have gained 4.58%, at a time when emerging markets remain deep in the red, with losses of 11.15%, due to poor performance in 2011. Markets overall grew 14.07% in 2012, where they had lost 10.67% in 2011. An examination of performance on emerging markets in the past year reveals considerable differences, though negative performance remains the exception (three countries, including Morocco, which lost 14.70%, and the Czech Republic, which was down 3.23%). Gains vary from 2.81% for Indonesia to more than 60% for Turkey, 44.38% for the Philippines, 42.18% for Egypt, 39.61% for Thailand, and 34.12% for Poland. Over three years, the two big winners are the Philippines, with gains of 126.68%, and Thailand, with gains of 102.35%.

Selon nos informations, la Fondation de France a sélectionné 4 OPCVM ouverts en remplacement d’un mandat de gestion sur les actions euro avec l’aide de son consultant habituel, à savoir Amadeis. La Fondation de France a investi 38 millions d’euros dans des fonds gérés par les 4 sociétés de gestion suivantes : Financière de l’Echiquier Banque du Luxembourg Comgest Montpensier Finance

CVC Capital Partners a annoncé hier avoir fait une offre de rachat à Bain Capital et Clessidra sur Cerved Group, valorisant la société d’informations financières italienne à 1,13 milliard d’euros. CVC prévoit d’investir 350 millions d’euros pour développer à l’international les activités de Cerved, jusqu’ici circonscrites au marché italien.

Le compromis signé hier ne règle pas la question du déficit budgétaire et du relèvement du plafond de la dette

Selon Dealogic, les prêts syndiqués en dollars octroyés aux entreprises européennes se sont chiffrés à 29,7 milliards en 2012 en hausse de 60%

Bercy assure que le manque à gagner sera de 500 millions d'euros pour l'année 2013. Il ne renonce pas à la taxe à 75% sur les hauts revenus

Le compromis signé hier ne règle pas la question du déficit budgétaire et du relèvement du plafond de la dette

La hausse des prix à la consommation en Allemagne s’est légèrement accélérée à un rythme annuel de 2,1% en décembre, après 1,9% en novembre. L’Etat allemand et la Bundesbank ont toutes les deux laissé entendre qu’ils accepteraient une hausse des prix tant que l’inflation au niveau européen demeurait contrôlée. Elle devrait baisser à 2,1% en décembre après 2,2% en novembre.

Les prix des logements neufs en Espagne ont subi en 2012 leur cinquième année consécutive de baisse, de 6,9% sur un an, pour retomber à leurs plus bas niveaux depuis début 2003, selon une enquête publiée par la Sociedad de Tasacion. La baisse atteint en moyenne 33,5% depuis 2007, et devrait se poursuivre cette année, selon l’association immobilière. De quoi gonfler les créances douteuses des banques transférées vers la «bad bank».

La Réserve fédérale américaine a annoncé hier soir que le compte-rendu (les minutes) de son dernier comité de politique monétaire (FOMC) sera publié aujourd’hui au lieu d’hier, sans pour autant donner de justification à ce report inhabituel. Les minutes du FOMC des 11 et 12 décembre derniers seront ainsi publiées ce soir à 19h00 GMT.

La banque centrale du pays n’aurait envisagé aucun mouvement de ses taux directeurs à sa dernière réunion de décembre sur fond de croissance solide et de hausse des prix sous contrôle, selon ses minutes publiées hier. L’autorité monétaire maintient ses taux à 5% depuis un an.

L’année 2013 sera «dure» mais «meilleure», a estimé le ministre grec des Finances, Yannis Stournaras lors d’un entretien accordé hier à la radio Alpha. Il a espéré qu'à la fin de l’année, la Grèce allait passer à un taux de croissance mais que cela ne sera pas suffisant «pour transformer 2013 en une année de croissance». Le pays prévoit une sixième année consécutive de récession, avec un PIB en recul de 4,5%, après une chute de 6,5% attendue pour 2012.