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20/08/2012

Assets up despite a decline in inflows for RLAM

Royal London Asset Management (RLAM) has reported a net outflow in first half of GBP310m, due to a reduction by three clients of their exposure to bonds. Assets under management have nonetheless increased by GBP900m, to GBP44.9bn as of 30 June 2012, according to interim results published on 17 August. RLAM has also announced that its assets under administration on the Ascentric platform increased 16% in the period under review, to GBP4.3bn.
20/08/2012

Outflows from hedge funds in June

According to a monthly survey by TrimTabs and BarclayHedge, hedge funds worldwide in June saw net redemptions of USD4.9bn, representing 0.3% of their assets, following net subscriptions of USD1.1bn in May. The 3,012 funds concerned as of 30 June posted assets of USD1.710bn, compared with USD1.730bn as of 31 May (-1.3%). This figure is 29.5% lower than the peak of USD2.4trn recorded at the end of June 2008.The BarclayHedge hedge fund index, meanwhile, on the basis of results released by 1,797 funds as of 17 August, gained 0.80% in July, compared with 0.66% in June. In the first seven months of the year, the index is up 3.13%. Of the 17 sub-indices, only the 51 equity funds of the Asia-Pacific region show losses last month (-0.24%). In January-July, the only strategy that shows losses is equity short bias (-7.33%). The strongest gains in the period were 6.06% for 27 convertible arbitrage funds.
20/08/2012

Sunny month in July for hedge funds

The 13 hedge fund strategies regularly monitored by the Edhec Risk Institute in July have posted positive results, with the best result for CTA Global (+3.05%) and global macro (+1.51%). Since the beginning of this year, 12 strategies show gains, including convertible arbitrage (+6%) and fixed income arbitrage (+5.1%). while short selling showed losses of 7.4%.No strategy shows excess returns as compared to risk: all Sharpe ratios are lower than 1. Only distressed securities comes near with 0.96, while short-selling and funds of funds have negative Sharpe ratios of 0.26 and 0.11. The BarclayHedge hedge fund index, meanwhile, on the basis of results released by 1,797 funds as of 17 August, gained 0.80% in July, compared with 0.66% in June. In the first seven months of the year, the index is up 3.13%. Of the 17 sub-indices, only the 51 equity funds of the Asia-Pacific region show losses last month (-0.24%). In January-July, the only strategy that shows losses is equity short bias (-7.33%). The strongest gains in the period were 6.06% for 27 convertible arbitrage funds. According to a monthly survey by TrimTabs and BarclayHedge, hedge funds worldwide in June saw net redemptions of USD4.9bn, representing 0.3% of their assets, following net subscriptions of USD1.1bn in May. The 3,012 funds concerned as of 30 June posted assets of USD1.710bn, compared with USD1.730bn as of 31 May (-1.3%). This figure is 29.5% lower than the peak of USD2.4trn recorded at the end of June 2008.
20/08/2012

Varengold names a chairman for its board

The supervisory board at the German investment bank Varengold Wertpapierhandelsbank, a specialist in asset management (managed futures) and brokerage, has appointed one of its founders and a member of its managing board, yasin Sebastian Qureshi, as its chairman.The managing board remains unchanged in its overall composition, with Steffen Fix, who created a quantitative trading technique, and Mohammad-Hans Dalmatschi (managed futures), who joined the board on 6 March. The three men are founders of Varengold, a stock-exchange filing says.Meanwhile, Willi Müller is stepping down as chairman of the supervisory board, a position which will now be occupied by Hans J. M. Manteuffel. Müller remains a member of the supervisory board, along with Peter Andree.
20/08/2012

Hedge funds have little time for Facebook

At the end of a catastrophic week for Facebook, quarterly figures released by hedge funds suggest that many more of them had bet against against than for Facebook. Rumours are rife on the markets that hedge funds were not required to disclose their short positions, the news agency Reuters reports. Only a few actors in alternative management are said to have bet against the firm founded by Mark Zuckerberg, including George Soros, Steve Cohen (SAC Capital Advisors) and John Thaler (JAT Capital Management). On Thursday evening, Facebook fell below USD20bn, a decline of nearly 50% from its value at its IPO of USD38 per share.
20/08/2012

Strong increase in net inflows at Rothschild Bank Zurich

The private bank Rothschild Bank Zurich has posted a net inflows in the 2011/2012 fiscal year ending on 31 March of CHF971m, up 36% year on year, the website finews reports. Its assets under management increased over the past year by 4%, to a total of CHF13.3bn. Unlike most of its rivals, the Zurich-based bank has recruited staff in the past fiscal year, with a 13% increase in its personnel in Switzerland alone to 452. This policy of recruitment and investment in IT has dragged down profits, which fell 41% in the past fiscal year, to CHF19.6m.
20/08/2012

Thanks to UBS, Frankfurt nears 1,000 listed ETFs

With the institutional (I) and retail (A) share classes in its newly-listed equity fund replicating the MSCI Brazil index, UBS Global Asset Management has given the XTF segment of the Xetra electronic trading platform its 998th and 999th listed ETFs. They are Luxembourg-registered products, which track an index that includes 78 Brazilian mid- and large caps, which collectively represent 84% of the floating capital on the Sao Paulo stock exchange. As for the other ETFs from UBS Global AM, the market maker is Commerzbank.Characteristics:Name: UBS (Irl) ETF plc – MSCI Brazil (USD) I-disISIN code: IE00B7VZ2C84TER: 0.43%Name: UBS (Irl) ETF plc – MSCI Brazil (USD) A-disISIN code: IE00B6SBCY47TER: 0.60%
20/08/2012

Swiss banks to emphasize asset management

As offshore business from tax dodgers dries up, Swiss banks are seeking areas for growth in investment funds and institutional clients, Handelsblatt reports. These areas are less profitable than other areas of banking activity, but also less risky. Trade bodies and political leaders have seen the writing on the wall and are now planning an offensive: they are planning to seek to prevent excessive regulation in a misguided effort to protect investors. Switzerland is also benefiting from the fact that London no longer has as much support from the British government as in the past.
20/08/2012

Price war in ETF market

Since February, Vanguard has been aggressively lowering its TER rates for its ETFs, which has allowed it to gain market share on the US market. The Börsen-Zeitung reports that that the market is now expecting the leader, iShares, to be obliged to lower its prices in retaliation. Smaller producers are withdrawing some of their ETFs from the market, when they do not completely liquidate the activity (as Scottrade is doing with its MocusShares line, or as Russell is considering doing). This will be a cause for concern for European providers too, as Vanguard arrived in May in London with five products.
20/08/2012

Seven new iShares ETFs listed in Zurich

SIX Swiss Exchange has announced that it has admitted seven new ETFs from iShares (BlackRock group) to trading. They are Irish-registered physical replication funds for which the market maker is Susquehanna; TERs range from 0.20% to 0.65%. ETF ISIN code TER iShares Barclays Capital Emerging Markets Local Govt Bond IE00B5M4WH52 0.50% iShares Barclays Capital Euro Corporate Bond ex-Financials IE00B4L5ZG21 0.20% iShares Dow Jones Emerging Markets Select Dividend IE00B652H904 0.65% iShares Markit iBoxx $ High Yield Capped Bond IE00B4PY7Y77 0.50% iShares MSCI Japan Monthly EUR Hedged IE00B42Z5J44 0.64% iShares MSCI World Monthly EUR Hedged IE00B441G979 0.55% iShares S&P500 Monthly EUR Hedged IE00B3ZW0K18 0.45%
20/08/2012

Financial sector fires a barrage against MiFID directive

In their responses to a proposed transposition of the European MiFID directive submitted to the German federal finance ministry on Friday, banking and asset management associations suggest that it should remain possible to launch open-ended real estate funds. They also claim that rules regulating products which will continue to be available to retail investors, including an increase in minimal subscription levels, are not appropriate and are discriminatory, and carry additional risks for retail investors. The associations claim that the proposed transposition significantly toughens the measures set out in the directive, and run the risk of penalising Germany as a financial centre against Luxembourg and Ireland.
20/08/2012

Euro zone mutual fund issues hold stable

Assets in shares issued in 2012 my non-money market mutual funds in the euro zone have remained virtually unchanged compared with those recorded one quarter previusly in March 2012, according to statistics released by the European Central Bak. These results are due to net issues, which were offset by a decline in the value of shares. Assets in shares issued by non-money market mutual funds in the euro zone increased slightly, to EUR6.065trn in June 2012, compared with EUR6.064trn in March 2012. In the same period, assets in shares issued by money market mutual funds in the euro zone increasedc from EUR957bn to EUR969bn. Net subscriptions to shares in non-money market mutual funds in the euro zone totalled EUR36bn in second quarter 2012, while net subscriptions to money market mutual funds were negative by EUR5bn. In terms of ventilation by investment strategy, the annual pace of share issues by bond funds came out to 47% in June 2012, while net subscriptions totalled EUR54bn in second quarter 2012. For equity funds, the figure was -3.3%, and net subscriptions were -EUR15bn in the same period. For mixed funds, the rate of growth was -1.4%, and net subscriptions were -EUR8bn.
20/08/2012

Rothschild to launch a fund to finance SMEs

The business bank Rothschild will be launching a fund in September dedicated to financing European SMEs, Agefi reports, citing statements form a director of the bank on Friday. The fund, with EUR400m to EUR500m in assets, will specialise in high yield and mezzanine debt.
20/08/2012

Russell launches new strategies

Russell Investments on 15 August announced the launch of two new funds, the Russell Multi-Strategy Alternative Fund and the Russell U.S. Strategic Equity Fund, as well as an update to the US equity allocaiton for several portfolios. Among the changes introduced are modifications to strategies, currencies and benchmark indices for the Russell U.S. Growth Fund and the Russell U.S. Quantitative Equity Fund. The two funds become the Russell U.S. Defensive Equity Fund and the Russell U.S. Dynamic Equity Fund, respectively.
20/08/2012

Jon Corzine plans to launch a hedge fund

Jon Corzine, the former head of MF Global, is planning to launch a hedge fund to engage his passion for trading, MarketWatch reports, citing the New York Times. “If Corzine can show a few years of decent returns he just may be able to salvage his ability to walk into a Wall Street cocktail party without people looking away and snickering,” the website quips.
20/08/2012

Adveq opens an office in Hong Kong

Following openings in Beijing in 2008 and Shanghai in 2011, the Swiss asset management firm Adveq, a specialist in private equity fund of funds (USD4.5bn), has opened an office in Hong Kong. The office will be led by David Seex, a specialist in alternative investments in Asia. He had previously been CEO of RAB Capital for Asia, after serving as head of alternative investments for Asia at Citigroup.
20/08/2012

Ignis Advisers recruits a head for credit strategies

The alternative management division fo Ignis Asset Management, Ignis Advisers, has recruited Ingrid Neitsch as head of credit strategies, FundWeb reports. She will join the firm at the beginning of September, and will be responsible for hedge fund and private equity investments in credit markets, as Ignis Advisers is planning to launch a credit strategy fund in fourth quarter. Neitsch joins the firm from the institutional fund management firm Financial Risk Management (FRM), which has recently been acquired by Man Group, where she had been sector head in charge of credit and manager of the FRM Long-Short Credit Fund.
20/08/2012

Mercer recruits in Asia

The regional director of Russell Investments in charge of structured investment solutions, Edmund Teo, has recently been recruited by the consulting firm Mercer as an addition to the 17-member team based in Singapore specialised in wealth management in Asia. Teo will report to Cara Williams, global head of wealth management in London, Investment Europe states. Teo will be assisted by Pierre DeGagne, who had previously been in charge of fund selection at Standard Chartered Bank.
20/08/2012

New team dedicated to ETFs in Asia at iShares

iShares is setting up a new team in Asia-Pacific specialised in ETFs, which will help clients and distributors to better understand the technical aspects of ETFs (product liquidity, construction of indices, and comparisons between products), Asian Investor reports. The new head of iShares for Asia-Pacific, Jane Leung, who began in the role last month, claims that the recent introduction of ETFs dedicated to A-class shares under RQFII (qualified foreign institutional investors in RMB) quotas are not expected to reduce the popularity of its FTSE A50 China ETF. Assets under management in the FTSE A50 China ETF s of 30 June totalled USD5.73bn. It is the largest A-class equity ETF in the world by asset volume.
20/08/2012

Former top dog at Deutsche Bank to head Russian sovereign fund?

According to the Russian newspaper Wedomosti, relayed by finews.ch, Josef Ackermann, former chairman of the managing board at Deutsche Bank (until last May), and currencly chairman of the board of directors at Zurich Insurance, has accepted a position on the board of directors of the future official Russian agency Rosfinagenstva, which will be given responsibility by the Russian finance ministry for managing the various Russian sovereign funds. The banker is also rumoured to be up for the position of chairman of the board of Rosfinagentstva, a body which is expected to be founded by the end of this year.
20/08/2012

RBC Investor Services makes a recruitment

RBC Investor Services on 20 August announced the appointment of Kevin Hogan as director, Client Operations for Australia. In his new role, Hogan, who previously worked at Macquarie Investment Management, will be in charge of all client operations (custody, fund administration and all associated services).
20/08/2012

Ikano sells funds to Sparinvest

Ikano Fonder, an asset management firm owned by the Swedish Kamprad family, founder of Ikea, will close its asset management boutique and transfer its three Luxembourg-registered funds to the Danish firm Sparinvest. “The funds have become so small that they are no longer viable economically,” Jesper Nielsen, CEO of Ikano Fonder, explains to Privata Affärer. According to the Swedish news service TT, assets at Ikano Fonder total about SEK200m, or EUR22m. Sparinvest will take over the funds on 28 September, and merge them with its own. For example, the global fund from Ikano will be merged into the Sparinvest Global Value fund. The Ikano group has been managing funds since 1999. The three funds of the range were the Global Strategy, European Equity and All Seasons. They were on sale to individual and institutional clients in Luxembourg, Sweden, the Netherlands and Denmark.
20/08/2012

Les prix de l'immobilier remontent en Chine

Selon des données officielles, les prix des maisons neuves en Chine ont grimpé en juillet par rapport au mois précédent dans 49 des 70 villes suivies par le gouvernement. Il s’agit du nombre le plus important depuis mai. Les acheteurs sont revenus sur le marché après deux baisses de taux depuis juin. Les restrictions sur les achats immobiliers sont toutefois maintenues, ce qui devrait empêcher tout rebond prononcé.
20/08/2012

Le moral des ménages américains à un plus haut de trois mois

Selon l’enquête mensuelle Reuters-Université du Michigan, l’indice du sentiment des consommateurs a grimpé à 73,6 en première estimation début août contre 72,3 en juillet et alors que les économistes interrogés par Reuters l’attendaient en légère hausse à 72,4. Le moral des ménages américains s’est ainsi amélioré pour atteindre un plus haut de trois mois, les promotions consenties dans les magasins et les faibles taux des crédits immobiliers ayant favorisé la consommation.
20/08/2012

Pas de répit contre l'évasion fiscale en Allemagne

Dans un entretien à Bild, le ministre-président du Land de Rhénanie-du-Nord-Westphalie, Hannelore Kraft, assure que son administration continuera à acheter des CD contenant des données sur les Allemands cherchant à échapper à l’impôt en plaçant leurs avoirs sur des comptes suisses. Le responsable estime que l’acquisition de ces disques est parfaitement légale.
20/08/2012

Un sursis pour la Grèce lié au rapport de la Troïka

Les pays de l’Union européenne attendront le rapport de la «Troïka» et une demande officielle grecque pour se prononcer sur un éventuel sursis accordé à Athènes pour assainir ses finances, a déclaré samedi le ministre des Affaires européennes Bernard Cazeneuve. La Grèce s’apprête à demander à ses partenaires deux ans de plus pour atteindre l'équilibre budgétaire, en 2016, a affirmé mercredi dernier le Financial Times. Selon le quotidien, le Premier ministre grec, Antonis Samaras, formulera cette demande au cours d’entretiens avec Angela Merkel le 24 août à Berlin et François Hollande le 25 à Paris. Le ministre allemand des Finances, Wolfgang Schäuble, a affirmé pour sa part samedi que l’aide allouée à la Grèce n'était pas illimitée et qu’Athènes ne devait pas compter sur un nouveau plan de sauvetage. Le président de l’Eurogroupe, Jean-Claude Juncker, a déclaré samedi que cet éventuel sursis de deux ans n'était pas pour le moment une nécessité urgente.
20/08/2012

Mario Monti entrevoit la sortie de crise

«Il y a un an, nous pensions moins que nous ne le faisons aujourd’hui que nous étions dans une crise mais je crois que nous y étions encore davantage», a déclaré hier le président du Conseil italien lors d’une conférence de presse. Mario Monti a ajouté qu’il voyait la fin de la crise «se profiler d’une certaine manière».
20/08/2012

Pierre Moscovici voit un «réel potentiel de croissance en 2013»

Dans un entretien au Journal du Dimanche, le ministre français de l’Economie et des Finances ajoute qu’une révision de la prévision de croissance pour 2013, établie pour l’heure à 1,2% dans la perspective de la préparation de la loi de Finances, «n’est pas d’actualité». Pour Pierre Moscovici, la croissance faible n’est «pas une fatalité».

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