The US asset management firm AllianceBernstein has announced that the research firm Sanford C. Bernstein has scaled up its Asia team with the recruitment of three analysts.Kenneth Tsang, head of research & strategy for Asia Pacific at LaSalle Investment Management, will be specialised in Asian real estate, while Kevin Kwek (ex Standard Chartered Bank in Singapore) will cover banks in South-East Asia, and Vanessa Lau (ex Alcoa) will be responsible for metals and mining.

Francesco Fanti has been appointed as head of private banking at Banca Monte dei Paschi de Siena. He will aim to consolidate and relaunch the activities of the unit.

Assets under management at the alternative management group Fortress Investment increased 8% in third quarter to a total of USD51.5bn as of 30 September, according to statistics released by Fortress. The increase is already 18% compared with third quarter 2011.Traditional asset management activities of Logan Circle finished the quarter with net inflows of USD2bn. Assets under management at Logan increased 14% compared with fourth quarter, at a total of USD20.6bn. All 15 strategies offered by Logan outperformed their respective indices in third quarter, while 14 out of 15 did to in the first nine months of the year.

Franklin Templeton Investments (a brand name of Franklin Resources) has announced that it has completed the acquisition of a majority stake in K2 Advisors (USD9bn in assets, see elsewhere in today’s Newsmanagers), a fund of hedge fund management firm founded in 1994 by William A. Douglas III and David C. Saunders, for an undisclosed amount. The proceeds of the transaction will allow K2 to acquire the entire stake previously held by TA Associates in its capital, as well as withdrawing all bonds issued buy K2 from the market.The current directors of K2 have not sold any of their stake in the business, nor received any compensation from the acquirer.Franklin Templeton is expected to acquire the remaining shares in K2 Advisors over a period of several years.

At the end of 2010, Barclays Wealth and Investment Management had EUR6bn in assets under management in France. The objective was then to double the size of these assets by 2014. But assets have fallen to EUR3.5bn currently. “We have posted redemptions from money markets, whose assets totalled EUR3.4bn four years ago, and EUR1.5bn today, and from structured products, which have seen their assets halved, from EUR1.5bn to EUR600m,” explains William Mussat, managing director wealth and investment management, at a press conference on Monday morning. The outflows are also due to the significant weight of internal networks as a part of Barclays WIM clients in France. But these are tending to shrink. The proportion was 90/10 three years ago. Now, the proportion of external clients stands at one third of assets, and the objective is to increase this proportion in order to ideally reach an even footing with group clients. In order to slow outflows and win over more external clients, Barclays Wealth and Investment Management in France has updated its product range. Since April, the firm has registered 16 sub-funds of its Global Access mandate fund range in France, which had previously been reserved for British clients. The funds, which invest in various asset classes and have EUR3.6bn in assets, have already attracted over EUR100m from French clients. Meanwhile, 17 French-registered funds, with a total of EUR1bn, have been merged with other Luxembourg-registered funds, as part of a vast reorganisation of the product range throughout Europe, benefiting from the possibilities offered by the UCITS IV directive. In total, the European product range from Barclays WIM is now composed of 40 funds, compared with 100 three years ago. These are now grouped into two product ranges, one of which includes funds dedicated to local markets, while the other is centred on profiled funds. With this framework in place, Paris remains the centre of management for European equity and convertible bond management, while multi-management is in London, euro fixed income in Madrid, and Asian equity management in Hong Kong and Singapore. While awaiting the results of this repositioning, Barclays Wealth and Investment Management have seen net redemptions in France of EUR250m since the beginning of the year.

BNP Paribas on 5 November announced the launch of BNP Paribas France Crédit, a common investment fund (FCP) which will allow it to place loans granted to mid-sized business totalling EUR250m over 3 years with its insurance affiliate, BNP Paribas Cardif.“With this deal, the BNP Paribas group fully confirms its desire to be present alongside businesses, and or orient the financial savings of the French towards financing them,” BNP Paribas says in a statement. The FCP BNP Paribas France Crédit invests primarily in mortgage debts with a maturity of under 6 years, acquired on the primary market, mostly within syndicated loans. It may also intervene in private corporate bond placements from businesses making their first issues on capital markets. The typical size of each investment by the fund is about EUR10m to EUR20m.BNP Paribas Investment Partners provides financial management of the FCP. In this role, it is responsible for analysis and selection of investment targets, in line with performance, security, and diversification objectives set by BNP Paribas Cardif.

“ America is facing an urgent crisis, barely discussed during the fall’s election campaign,” a group of asset management firms and pension funds warns in a one-page advertisement placed in several major United States newspapers on Monday, the Financial Times reports. BlackRock, which organised and financed the advertisement, says that the fiscal cliff is the largest concern for investors surveed in October, who have a collective total of USD5trn in assets under management.

Wells Fargo Asset Management is considering acquiring a fund of hedge fund operation with assets under management of up to USD12bn, Financial News reports.The head of Wells Fargo AM, Mike Niedermeyer, says he would like to provide clients with expertise in the area of allocation to and selection of hedge funds. “This is what clients ask for most often,” says Niedermeyer.Recenly, the private equity giant KKR acquired the FoF management firm Prisma Capital Partners, whose AUM total USD8bn, while Franklin Templeton has recently bought a majority stake in K2 Advisors, a FoF firm with USD9bn in AUM.

John K. Moninger will join Eaton Vance Distributors as director of retail sales on November 26, 2012, in which role he will be responsible for leading all sales and relationship management for Eaton Vance’s brokerage and independent channels. He will be based in Boston and report to Matthew J. Witkos, president of Eaton Vance Distributors. John K. Moninger comes to Eaton Vance from LPL Financial, where he was executive vice president of Advisory and Brokerage Consulting Services, responsible for the firm’s advisory and brokerage platforms and for leading a team of product consultants.

Sabine Fillias has been promoted to CEO of Chausson Finance. She will now be responsible for managing all fundraising activities, under the direction of Christophe Chausson. Fillias is an alumna of Sciences Po Paris, HEC and Telecom Paris. She joined Chausson Finance in 2006. She began her career as a junior analyst to the Economic Mission of Hong Kong, and then as research manager at Mappy.

In third quarter, UK funds of funds posted net subscriptions of GBP754.5m, bringing the total for the first 12 months of 2012 to GBP2.2bn, less than 50% of the GBP4.6bn posted in the corresponding period of last year, according to statistics from the Investment Management Association (IMA).However, assets in funds of funds as of 30 September totalled GBP67.5bn, with a record 10.7% of assets managed in funds overall (compared with 10.4% twelve months earlier). Funds invested in third-party funds represented GBP33.9bn, while funds invested in internal funds total GBP33.6bn.Meanwhile, the IMA states that net subscriptions to tracker funds in July-September, at GBP263m, were the lowest since first quarter 2010, while the average in the previous four quarters was GBP471m. Assets in tracker funds as of the end of September totalled GBP47.7bn, a record 7.6% of the total for all funds, compared with 7.1% as of 30 September.Lastly, ethical funds have seen record net outflows in third quarter of GBP33m, while products had attracted an average of GBP9m in net subscriptions in the previous three quarters. As of 30 September, assets under management in these funds represent GBP7.3bn.

Investment Europe reports that Source has listed its smart beta Man GLG Europe ETF for trading on the London Stock Exchange, with share classes in pounds sterling, while the USD800m fund had previously only been available in the form of euro-denominated shares listed in Frankfurt (Deutsche Börse).

The new Swiss firm Globalance Bank is the first company in the world to integrate a balance sheet on the “sustainable” impact of investments in all asset classes in the real world into its traditional risk/return diagnostics of entire portfolios for each client, Handelsblatt reports.The Portfolio Footprint is calculated by specialists at Globalance on the basis of data from MSCI ESG Research, on the basis of nine criteria, with different weightings for a single criterion depending on the specific challenges of each sector or asset class, the CEO of Globalance, Reto Ringger, says.

As of the end of October, the European markets of NYSE Euronext listed 589 ETFs 679 times, up from 587 funds 676 times at the end of September, while six new products were introduced during October, four of which were from Lyxor, one from Ossiam and one from Amundi.However, average on-book daily trading volumes for ETFs on the European markets of NYSE Euronext in October totalled EUR217.4m, down 10.15% compared with EUR241.9m in September, but total block trading volumes have increased to EUR740.1m, compared with EUR739.9m the previous month (+0.11%), to represent 14.6% of total trading volumes on regulated ETF markets, compared with 15.3% in September.The total value of on-book trades came to EUR5bn, compared with EUR4.8bn in September, a lower level than the average of 5% posted since the beginning of the year.NYSE Euronext states that in October, the median spread for all publicly-traded ETFs has been 37.4 basis points, compared with 26.8 basis points in September.

The wealth management firm Partners Group is seeking to increase its investments, and is currently in talks on the subject with its co-founders and primary shareholders, Marcel Erni, Alfred Gantner and Urs Wietlisbach. According to a statement released by the firm on 5 November, the investors are discussing a proposal by which the co-owners would collectively invest CHF300m alongside clients of the business, and would finance that via a placement of some of their shares. This portion is said to be about 1.6 million shares, which would represent about 6% of equity capital. The proceeds of the operation would be used to finance investments. Many shareholders and potential shareholders have on several occasions expressed interest in an increased amount of publicly-traded capital in Partners Group shares. In order to respond to these desires, the founders, each of whom contrrols 14.2% of capital, are planning to reduce their stakes, but not by any more than 4%. “Each founder would then control over 10% of capital following this operation,” a statement says. At the end of first half, assets under management by Partners Group totalled EUR27.1bn, compared with EUR24.8bn at the end of 2011.

L’agence de notation a relevé la note à long terme de la Turquie dans la catégorie investissement, de BB+ à BBB-, assignant par ailleurs une perspective stable, décision attendue depuis longtemps par Ankara. Pour justifier sa décision, Fitch met en avant les points forts de l'économie turque (diminution du poids de la dette publique, un système bancaire sain, bon potentiel de croissance à moyen terme) ainsi qu’un recul des risques à court terme.

La croissance de l’activité dans le secteur des services aux Etats-Unis a légèrement ralenti au mois d’octobre, en raison notamment d’une baisse des nouveaux contrats malgré une l’amélioration sur le front de l’emploi. L’indice ISM est ressorti à 54,2 le mois dernier, contre 55,1 en septembre et 54,5 attendus par les économistes. La composante de l’emploi a progressé à 54,9 après 51,1 en septembre.

L’Espagne s’oppose à la nomination d’Yves Mersch au directoire de la Banque centrale européenne, ont déclaré des responsables de l’Union européenne cités par Reuters. Des membres du Parlement européen et du Conseil européen, ce dernier représentant les Etats membres, ont indiqué que l’Espagne avait fait obstacle à une tentative d’assurer la nomination par le biais d’une méthode accélérée dite «procédure écrite».

Réuni pour deux jours à Mexico, les ministres des Finances des pays du G20 s’engagent à «faire en sorte que le rythme de la consolidation budgétaire soit adapté à la volonté de soutenir la croissance», selon un projet de communiqué. Ils disent également vouloir s’attacher «à assurer la viabilité des finances publiques conformément aux engagements de Toronto».

Le jour où Louis Gallois propose une batterie de mesures pour accroître la compétitivité des entreprises françaises, le FMI participe au débat. Il a publié cet après-midi un rapport invitant la France à saisir «une opportunité unique pour entreprendre des réformes d’envergure». Les experts de Washington recommandant notamment de s’atteler à «corriger les dysfonctionnements du marché du travail qui entravent l’investissement, l’emploi et, en fin de compte, la croissance ; et accroître la concurrence dans le secteur des services».

Démissionnaire du conseil d’administration de Bumi,Nathaniel Rothschild aurait approché des magnats indonésiens en vue de former un consortium pour éjecter la famille Bakrie de Bumi. Selon le Financial Times, des contacts auraient été noués avec l’ancien général Prabowo Subianto et des hommes d’affaires locaux.

Les ventes de détail australiennes ont grimpé de 0,5% à 21,6 milliards de dollars locaux au mois de septembre, après une hausse de 0,3% en août. Parallèlement, le déficit extérieur s’est réduit à 420 millions, après 1,46 milliard en août. De quoi soutenir la devise qui rebondissait de 0,3% contre le billet vert ce matin à 1,0363, à la veille de la réunion mensuelle de la Banque centrale à l’issue de laquelle les marchés s’attendent à 53% à une baisse des taux directeurs.

La Grèce compte solliciter des offres pour sa participation de 61% dans Thessaloniki Water & Sewage, indique le président du Fonds hellénique de développement des actifs, Takis Athanasopoulos, qui évoque la nécessité d’un système fiscal stable et d’une meilleure gouvernance pour attirer les investisseurs. À la veille d’une semaine décisive, le premier ministre Antonis Samaras a brandi la menace d’une sortie de l’euro si le plan d’austérité n’était pas voté.

A trois jours du lancement du dix-huitième Congrès du Parti communiste chinois, l’indice non manufacturier établi par le Bureau national des statistiques a grimpé à 55,5 en octobre, contre 53,7 en septembre. «L’impact des mesures pour dynamiser la demande domestique est devenu plus apparent et a renforcé la confiance du marché», a expliqué Cai Jin, vice-président de la CFLP.

«Nous avons une haute estime pour le FMI, mais nous devons également faire savoir clairement que notre politique économique possède des fondements clés que nous ne sommes pas prêts à abandonner» a ainsi indiqué Peter Szijjarto, secrétaire de cabinet du Premier ministre. Le FMI a indiqué jeudi que les discussions sur un plan d’aide ne pourraient pas progresser tant que les autorités ne considéreront pas le Fonds comme un « partenaire valable».

Le gouvernement français proposera une baisse du coût du travail dans certains secteurs économiques et certains types d’entreprises, a laissé entendre hier la ministre déléguée chargée des Petites et moyennes entreprises, Fleur Pellerin, sur France 5. «Il y a des secteurs exposés à la concurrence internationale dans lesquels cela a un sens et d’autres secteurs où cela a moins de sens» a-t-elle précisé.

La croissance indienne devrait rester comprise entre 5,5 et 6% cette année, avant de rebondir à 7% en 2013 et à 8% en 2014, selon un entretien accordé par le ministre des finances du pays, Palaniappan Chidambaram, à Reuters. La banque centrale s’attend à une croissance de 5,8% cette année, et à une inflation de 7,5%. Lors d’un congrès, le Premier ministre, Manmohan Singh, a réitéré sa volonté d’ouvrir l’économie aux investisseurs étrangers.

Les analystes restent divisés sur la probabilité d'un taux à 0,50% à trois mois alors que les perspectives en zone euro sont médiocres

Malgré un coût pour l'économie revu en hausse, la perte de PIB au quatrième trimestre sera compensée par l'effort de reconstruction

Les gestions consacrent près de la moitié de leurs portefeuilles aux actions, soit le plus haut niveau depuis l’été 2011