Le groupe bancaire du Liechtenstein LGT a annoncé le 19 juin que ses activités d’Asset Management passaient au 1er juillet dans le périmètre de LGT Capital Partners, spécialisée en gestion alternative. Jusqu'à présent, les gestions de fortune traditionnelle et alternative étaient logées dans deux entités séparées, respectivement LGT Capital Management et LGT Capital Partners. Les actifs sous gestion des deux divisions s'élèvent à environ 40 milliards de francs suisses.LGT estime dans un communiqué que les frontières entre gestion tradionnelle et gestion alternative se sont estompées ces dernières années, ce qui justifiait une telle décision. Par ailleurs, ce redéploiement va permettre à la banque d’optimiser son offre de produits ainsi que le le conseil à la clientèle. La nouvelle structure devrait également permettre de réaliser une plus forte croissance et de dégager des synergies non précisées.LGT Capital Partners continuera de se positionner comme une société de de gestion alternative avec des expertises dans différents secteurs tels que le private equity ou les hedge funds. Le CEO de LGT Capital Partners, Roberto Paganoni, dirigera la nouvelle structure à compter du 1er juillet. Torsten de Santos, CEO de LGT Capital Management, va quitter la banque. Il restera toutefois conseiller de LGT et membre du conseil d’administration de différentes sociétés de fonds.

Axa Investment Managers a recruté Shalin Bhagwan, de Legal & General Investment Management, et Lucy Barron, qui a travaillé chez Insight Investment Management, en vue de bâtir une activité de gestion sous contrainte de passif (ou LDI) au Royaume-Uni, rapporte Financial News, citant des sources proches du dossier.

La sicav luxembourgeoise Investec GSF s'élargit à un nouveau compartiment, le Latin America Smaller Companies Fund, géré outre-Atlantique par Compass Group, rapporte Investment Week. Ce fonds de petites capitalisations latino-américaines débute avec un encours externe de 100 millions de dollars. Il est géré par Carina Güerisoli, CIO actions chez Compass. L’indice de référence est le MSCI EM Small Cap Latin America.

Le britannique Schroders vient de lancer un fonds qui propose un rendement annuel de 7,5% sur la moitié de sa durée de vie d’une vingtaine d’années, rapporte Investment Week.Ce fonds est un produit hybride avec des caractéristiques d’un unit trust et d’un produit structuré, dans la mesure où il a une durée de vie bien définie mais affiche également la même tarification qu’un autre unit trust proposé par Schroders.Il sera géré par l'équipe multi-classes d’actifs dirigée par Johanna Kyrklund.

La société de gestion britannique Aberdeen Asset Management vient de recruter Alex Kim en qualité de responsable du développement en Corée, rapporte Asian Investor.Alex Kim travaillait précédemment chez Russell Investments où il occupait des fonctions similaires.

Stuart Sharp va quitter Franklin Templeton dont il est «vice president» le 22 juin, rapporte FundWeb. Paul Spencer et Richard Bullas vont reprendre la gestion du fonds Franklin UK Smaller Companies.

M&G a élargi sa gamme de fonds multi-classes d’actifs avec l’addition d’un portefeuille défensif, le fonds M&G Episode Defensive, rapporte Investment Week. Ce produit sera géré par Eric Lonergan. Par ailleurs, la société de gestion renomme sa gamme de fonds multi-classes d’actifs sous l’appellation «Episode».

La banque privée suisse Union Bancaire Privée (UBP) va supprimer une centaine d’emplois à Zurich, dans le cadre de l’intégration des activités d’ABN Amro en Suisse, a-t-elle indiqué le 19 juin.Dans le cadre de son plan d’intégration lié au rachat d’ABN Amro Bank (Suisse), l’UBP réduit ses effectifs, a déclaré un porte-parole de l'établissement à l’agence ATS, confirmant ainsi des informations parues dans la presse helvétique.Début juin, la banque privée avait annoncé la suppression d’une trentaine d’emplois à Genève, après avoir déjà réduit ses effectifs de 45 postes dans cette ville. UBP avait annoncé en août 2011 le rachat de la filiale suisse du groupe bancaire néerlandais ABN Amro pour un montant non divulgué.Avant d'être absorbée par UBP, ABN Amro Bank (Suisse) employait plus de 350 collaborateurs à Genève, Zurich, Bâle et Lugano, lesquels avaient tous été repris par la banque genevoise.

Le groupe de capital-risque Index Ventures, présent à Londres, Genève et San Francisco a lancé un fonds axé sur les start-up en phase de développement early-stage, dans le domaine des technologies innovantes, rapporte L’Agefi suisse. Evalué à 350 millions d’euros, il appuie la formation et la croissance d’une sélection de jeunes pousses, situées principalement en Israël et en Europe.

Christoph Ammann, président du conseil d’administration, et Peter Derdinger, administrateur, tous deux membres indépendants du conseil d’administration de la Banque Sarasin, démissionneront en juillet, lorsque la Finma aura validé la cession au groupe Safra des actions Sarasin détenues par Rabobank. Une assemblée générale extraordinaire sera convoquée pour élire un nouveau conseil d’administration. Après la démission des deux administrateurs indépendants, les membres du conseil restants seront les représentants de Rabobank, Sipko N. Schat et Pim W. Mol, ainsi que Hans-Rudolf Hufschmid et Dagmar G. Woehrl.

Les actifs sous gestion de Société Générale Private Banking (Suisse) se sont accrus de 4% l’an dernier pour atteindre 25,9 milliards de francs, selon un communiqué publié le 18 juin. L’effet marché négatif a été compensé par une collecte nette de 1,5 milliard de francs suisses.Le bénéfice de la société a reculé de 7,6 millions de francs à 33,1 millions de francs. A noter que la banque privée a renforcé sa présence en Suisse francophone avec l’ouverture de nouveaux locaux à Genève dédiés à la gestion de fortune.

As Renta 4 Gestión did two weeks ago, the Spanish firm A&G Fondos has decided to convert its fund of hedge funds A&G Multistrategy into an absolute return UCITS-compliant fund, with a performance objective of 4-7%, which would invest solely in UCITS-compliant hedge funds, Funds People reports.A&G Fondos thus withdraws completely from the world of non-UCITS hedge funds. Currently, it manages EUR107m in six investment funds and 19 Sicavs and several Luxembourg products, with assets of EUR794m. A&G Fondos is the asset management firm for the A&G group (EUR4bn), in which the largest shareholder is EFG International.

For an undisclosed amount, Union Investment Real Estate has acquired a commercial property on the pedestrian shopping street Bahnhofstraße in Ulm from Achim Griese Treuhandgesellschaft mhH. The property, which is wholly leased, will be added to the portfolio of the open-ended real estate fund UniImmo: Deutschland (DE0009805507).Currently. Union Investment is focusing its investments on retail commerce in shopping centres or specialised commercial areas, in urban areas with over 100,000 inhabitants. The asset management firm is interested in properties requiring an investment of over EUR15m.

The wealth of high net worth individuals, i.e. their investment capacity, fell in all regions in 2011, except in the Middle East. The decline of 1.7% is the first since the global economic crisis of 2008, a year in which the wealth of millionaires declined by 19.5%, according to the World Wealth Report 2012, published on 19 June by Capgemini and its new partner, the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC). The number of high net worth private investors increased by 1.6% in the Asia-Pacific region, to 3.37 million in 2011. This region for the first time leads, with the largest number of millionaires, ahead of North America with 3.35 million. North America remains the region where the largest amount of wealth is concentrated, with USD114trn, compared with USD107trn in the Asia-Pacific region. Following strong growth in 2010 (+8.3%), the number of high net worth individuals worldwide increased 0.8% to 11 million in 2011. This slight increase is largely due to high net worth individuals who have USD1m to USD5m in assets. This group, which has grown by 1.1%, represents 90% of all millionaires worldwide. By comparison, the wealth of the largest fortunes in the wold in 2011 fell by 1.7%, to a total of USD430trn (compared with an increase of 9.7% in 2010, to a total of USD427trn). The number of individuals worldwide in the highest net worth category fell 2.5% in 2011, and their total wealth fell 4.9%, following an increase of 10.2% and 11.5%, respectively, in 2010. In the rankings of the 12 countries with the largest numbers of millionaires, South Korea has overtaken India in 12th place, whie the top three countries (United States, Japan and Germany) include 53.3% of high net worth individuals, a slight increase compared with 2010 (53.1%), Mong this group of countries, Brazil has seen the higest growth rate, with the number of millionaires up 6.2%. Following a nearly normal period in 2010, volatility levels peaked in November due to concerns of potential contagion of the euro zone debt crisis to some other major economies. In the light of this chronic instability, many investors turned to refuge assets in 2011. The economic drivers of wealth were also diverse. They involved several asset classes and produced variable results: equities and commodities performed less well, while tangible investments lost value, as investors preferring to preserve their capital preferred money market and bond investments. The latter represented the best-performing category: the price of US long-term Treasury bonds reached all-time highs. In conclusion, the report finds that high net worth individuals should prepare themselves for a long-term volatility on the markets, and two-speed returns, which may be extremely positive or extremely negative, rather than evenly distributed.

Stuart Sharp va quitter Franklin Templeton dont il est «vice president» le 22 juin, rapporte FundWeb. Paul Spencer et Richard Bullas vont reprendre la gestion du fonds Franklin UK Smaller Companies.

Stuart Sharp will be leaving Franklin Templeton, where he is vice president, on 22 June, FundWeb reports. Paul Spencer and Richard Bullas will take over management of the Franklin UK Smaller Companies fund.

Axa Investment Managers has recruited Shalin Bhagwan, of Legal & General Investment Management, and Lucy Barron, who has worked at Insight Investment Management, to create a new liability-driven investment (LDI) activity in the United Kingdom, Financial News reports, citing sources familiar with the matter.

The British asset management firm Aberdeen Asset Management has recruited Alex Kim as head of development in Korea, Asian Investor reports. Kim previously worked at Russell Investments, where he served in a similar role.

The major hedge fund managers are betting on a massive sell-off of German government bonds in the next few months, the Financial Times reports. At the GAIM sector conference in Monaco, more than 50% of respondents said they are expecting returns on Bunds to double in one year. Gavyn Davies, the founder of Fulcrum Asset Management, explains that returns on German government bonds have been eroded by a flight of capital from other euro zone countries. But this pressure will not continue to hold down returns indefinitely.

The financial ratings agency Standard & Poor’s is predicting a rise in corporate defaults in 2012. In a study published on 19 June (“Eurozone Stress Pressures Corporate Defaults,”) the agency reports that in first quarter, defaults were limited by various injections of liquidity by the ECB in late 2011.The default rate over a rolling 12-month period, which at the end of March stood at 4.7%, compared with 2.6% as of the end of December 2011, may reach as much as 6.4% by the end of March 2013, the agency predicts.If there is a more severe recession (which the agency estimates as a 40% risk), the 12-month default rate may even top 8%. Standard & Poor’s explains that in the sample of 678 businesses taken into account in the study, 37% of businesses presented a major default risk (B- or lower). The study considered a sample of 678 speculative grade businesses in the European Union, Iceland, Norway and Switzerland, 61% of which are based in Germany, France and the United Kingdom. Greek and Cypriot businesses represented 1.4% of the sample.In peripheral European countries, the default rates are higher than average. In Spain and Italy, the cumulative default rate between the beginning of 2008 and March 2012 is over 45%, far higher than those for other major European countries.In the United Kingdom, default rates over the past 12 months are high (7.5%). Since 2008, the cumulative rate is over 30%. In the vast majority of casis, these defaults are the result of pre-crisis LBOs.French businesses have low default rates (1.6% over 12 months, 21% since 2008). However, their credit quality is lower than for German or British businesses: 42% of French businesses in the sample are rated B- to CCC, compared with 34% in the United Kingdom and an average of 36% in Europe. This phenomenon may be due to the dissuasive cost of bankruptcy procedures, and incentives to preserve jobs.

The Liechtenstein banking group LGT on 19 June announced that its Asset Management activities would on 1 July be moving internally to LGT Capital Partners, a specialist in alternative management. Traditional and alternative wealth management had recently been in two separate entities, LGT Capital Management and LGT Capital Partners, respectively. Assets under management at the two divisions total about CHF40bn. LGT estimates in a statement that the borders between traditional management and alternative management have been breaking down over the past few years, which justifies such a decision. The redeployment will also allow the bank to optimise its product range and client advising. New new structure will also allow the firm to earn larger growth and to realise synergies, the nature of which have not been disclosed. LGT Capital Partners will continue to position itself as an alternative asset management firm, with expertise in various sectors, such as private equity and hedge funds. The CEO of LGT Capital Partners, Roberto Paganoni, will direct the new structure from 1 July. Torsten de Santos, CEO of LGT Capital Management, will be leaving the bank. He will, however, remain as a consultant to LGT and as a member of the board of directors for various fund companies.

The British firm Schroders has launched a fund which offers annual returns of 7.5% over half of a 20-year life cycle, Investment Week reports. The fund is a hybrid product, with the characteristics of a unit trust and a structured product, insofar as it has a well-defined life cycle, but also charges the same price as another unit trust offered by Schroders. The fund will be managed by the multi-asset class team, led by Johanna Kyrklund.

M&G has extended its range of multi-asset class funds, with the addition of a defensive portfolio, the M&G Episode Defensive, Investment Week reports. The product will be managed by Eric Lonergan. The asset management firm has also re-named its multi-asset class fund range as “Episode.”

In order to improve the speed and robustness of its data management for UCITS-compliant hedge funds, and the calculation of its UCITS Alternatives index, the Swiss firm Alix Capital has selected the new FDM financial data management platform from Soft-Finance.FDM integrates a lot of functionalities, and allows for simultaneous access to data such as performance analysis, information on investment management, risk management, client relationship management (CRM) and document management.

The Canadian firm Manulife is seeking to sell its products on Hong Kong banking platforms, Asian Investor reports. Manulife has already signed distribution agreements with banks in the territory, including Bank of China and Bank of East Asia, but would also like to be featured on the platforms of other major actors in the region, such as Citi, HSBC and Standard Chartered. The firm has also announced that Myles Morin, vice president and head of investment funds at Manulife Hong Kong, will be leaving the territory in mid-July to deploy a similar development strategy for distribution channels in Canada.

At a presentation in Paris, Franck Dixmier, CIO for European fixed income, announced that Allianz Global Investors (AGI) is planning to mutualise its credit and equity research resources, a project which will be completed by the end of this year.The move affects five analyst and ten managers in credit, in Paris, and about 70 equity analysts throughout the network. The compliance department last week approved the proposal to connect the credit department up with equity research.The association between the two asset classes has its limits, however, as the issuers monitored by one or the other part of the activity are not necessarily the same. The objective is clearly an exchange of information, not to establish an investment model common to the two teams, says David Manoux, head of credit analysis. The move will, however, allow for knowledge to be shared between equity specialists, who intimately know the history of businesses, and credit experts, who have good knowledge of the financial realities of balance sheets.In Paris, AGI has about EUR16bn under management in credit, in the form of mandates and funds, while equities represent about EUR7.5bn, according to Catherine Garrigues, head of European equities for France. Overall, assets at AGI in France represent EUR70bn, of which EUR57bn are in fixed income (with slightly over 50% of that in govies). Multi-management and money markets have respective assets of EUR3.5bn and EUR3bn.

The Luxembourg Sicav Investec GSF is adding a new sub-fund, the Latin America Smaller Companies Fund, managed in the Americas by Compass Group, Investment Week reports. The fund of Latin American small caps is starting our with external assets of USD100m. It is managed by Carina Güerisoli, CIO for equities at Compass. The benchmark index is the MSCI EM Small Cap Latin America.

Bill Gross, founder and co-CIO of Pimco, says a bubble has formed in the German government bond market, due to the fact that Germany is assuming the ever-increasing burdens of the European sovereign debt crisis, Handelsblatt reports. There is little likelihood that German federal bonds may develop positively. The manager of the largest bond fund in the world says that Germany represents a credit risk, and that it is not an attractive market.

Hubertus Bäumer, who since 2008 had been head of indirect investments and fund development at Generali Immobilien, will at the end of July be joining Union Investment Institutional Property GmbH (EUR3.2bn), in the team under CEO Christoph Schumacher. He will be in charge of product development, client recruitment, and relationship management for institutional investors.

According to Financial Times Deutschland, relayed by Die Welt, Björn Jesch has resigned for personal reasons from his position as CIO of the private wealth management unit at Deutsche Bank. The departure, which is expected in third quarter 2012, is reportedly related to restructuring at the bank.