Le Chicago Mercantile Exchange a annoncé hier soir avoir augmenté ses appels de marge sur les contrats à terme de maïs, soja, lait, bois, riz, avoine et blé, traités sur le Chicago Board of Trade. Une mesure effective dès la prochaine séance de cotation.

Pamplona Capital Management, un fonds de private-equity russe, a annoncé avoir accru sa participation dans UniCredit de 1,99% à 5%, devenant ainsi le deuxième actionnaire de la banque italienne. Une participation qui a une valeur de marché de 700 millions d’euros, la banque ayant perdu les deux tiers de sa valeur de marché ces trois derniers mois. Les intentions de Pamplona seraient amicales, selon le Financial Times.

L’Espagne envisage de relever la TVA sur certains produits assujettis actuellement à un taux bas, afin de réduire le déficit budgétaire, a déclaré le ministère des Finances. Le taux de TVA espagnol - 18% - est l’un des plus faibles de l’Union européenne et de nombreux produits bénéficient de surcroît d’un taux réduit de 4% ou 8%.

Pour le gouverneur de la Banque de France, le solde des transactions courantes, déficitaire à hauteur de 1,9% du PIB fin 2011, doit s’améliorer. Ce déficit, persistant depuis 2005, représente en cumul 165 milliards. Outre l’impact de l'énergie, commun à toute la zone euro, la France présente un facteur spécifique : une compétitivité insuffisante, a souligné Christian Noyer.

Avec un net recul des recettes fiscales et une hausse des dépenses gouvernementales, le déficit budgétaire britannique (hors soutien public aux banques) a atteint 17,9 milliards de livres en mai, contre 15,2 milliards un an plus tôt, selon l’Office national des statistiques. Le consensus des économistes s’établissait à 14,8 milliards de livres.

L’agence de notation a ramené la note de l’Allemagne de AA- à A+ et assigné une perspective négative. Que la Grèce ou d’autres pays de la zone euro quittent ou pas l’union monétaire, l’Allemagne se retrouvera chargée de créances supplémentaires et irrécouvrables, explique Egan-Jones.

Elle est défendue par des élus, la Cour des comptes et certains cabinets d'audit pour apporter plus de transparence et de fiabilité

Le marché a enregistré des retraits pour 8,2 milliards en mai selon BarCap, la pire performance jamais observée après septembre 2011

L'Iosco assure que les règles de rétention du risque au bilan sont plus strictes qu'outre-Atlantique, où existent d'importantes exemptions

Les prix sont en modeste progression depuis trois mois. Les stocks de logements en vente baissent légèrement

De nombreux différends persistent, même sur l'union bancaire, la proposition la plus avancée

De nombreux différends persistent, même sur l'union bancaire, la proposition la plus avancée

Entourée d’un aléa principal lié à la crise de la dette en zone euro, la croissance du PIB français se limiterait à 0,4% en 2012 selon l’Insee

Carlyle resterait seul en lice pour monter un MBO, où l’ancienne direction de MetWest reprendrait la gestion de la filiale de la Société Générale

Les autorités chinoises prépareraient de nouvelles mesures destinées à renforcer les flux échangés en yuan entre le pays et Hong Kong, selon le journal qui cite des sources proches. Le président Hu Jintao pourrait ainsi profiter de sa visite de trois jours à Hong Kong qui débute vendredi pour annoncer notamment un assouplissement de la limite quotidienne de conversion de 20.000 yuans pour les résidents hongkongais. Pékin envisage également un assouplissement des règles du programme RQFII pour les sociétés étrangères souhaitant utiliser des yuans levés à Hong Kong pour investir sur les marchés financiers en Chine continentale.

Le Parlement allemand devrait se réunir de manière exceptionnelle le 6 juillet prochain afin de tenir un vote pour se prononcer sur la demande d’aide formulée par l’Espagne auprès de l’Union européenne, selon le journal qui cite des juristes au fait du dossier. Une autre session pourrait se tenir une semaine plus tard pour se pencher cette fois sur le cas de Chypre.

La croissance sera sans doute de 2% en Allemagne cette année mais elle retomberait à 1% en 2013, conséquence de la crise de la zone euro, rapporte le journal qui cite une prévision de l’institut de conjoncture Kiel Economics. «Pour l’Allemagne, le risque de récession s’est à nouveau sensiblement accru», estime Carsten-Patrick Meier, directeur de Kiel Economics.

Enrique Pardo, who joined the alternative management division of Allfunds Bank in 2008, has been appointed as director of research at the head of the investment analysis unit, Funds People reports. Pardo will be responsible for a global analysis team based in Madrid and London.Allfunds, a joint venture of Santander and Intesa Sanpaolo, is planning to recruit more employees in the British capital to increase its presence among the top international asset management firms.

The Boots pension fund has selected the real estate multi-management team at Schroders to manage a portfolio of GBP135m. The objective is to diversify the portfolio of the Boots Pension Scheme, which is highly exposed to the British real estate market, by investing in a selection of core, added value and opportunity-driven real estate funds.The real estate multi-management team at Schroders was formed in 1997, and currently has assets of about GBP2.5bn. Schroders had about GBP10.2bn in assets under management in the real estate sector as of 31 March.

First Trust Advisors will soon be launching its first actively-managed ETF, Mutual Fund Wire has announced. The First Trust North American Energy Infrastructure Fund will invest in energy infrastrucure, and will be managed by Energy Income Partners on behalf of the US asset management firm.

AllianceBernstein on 26 June announced the launch of an income strategy, the Lifetime Income Strategy, by the United Technologies Corporation (UTC), which is available through the group’s retirement programme. The new vehicle is designed to bring simplicity to a horizon fund, and security for lifetime income, similar to a defined-benefit programme.

The Basel Committee on 26 June launched a consultation on collection of information and risk reporting. The financial crisis has shown that many banks, including systemic banks, were incapable of rapidly and exhaustively finding their total exposure to risk, the Basel Committee says in a statement. “These proposals are an important step to improve the risk management capacities of banks,” says Stefan Ingves, chairman of the Basel Committee, and also governor of the central bank of Sweden. The consultation will be open until 28 September. The Basel Committee has also published a final revision of rules on information that banks must supply about the detailed composition of their capital.

The California pension fund CalPERS on 26 June announced the appointment of Ed Robertiello as a senior portfolio manager, in charge of absolute return strategies. Robertiello previously worked at Russell Investments, as managing director in charge of hedge funds. CalPERS has also announced that it has invested about USD100m in the real estate specialist Bentall Kennedy, taking over stakes previously controlled yb IvanhoeCambridge and the Caisse de Depot et Placement du Quebec. The California pension fund now controls about 33% of capital in Bentall, while the other two thirds are controlled in equal proportions by British Columbia Investment Management Coporation (bcIMC) and the management of Bentall.

As it did not succeed in winning over potential investors, the US firm J.P. Morgan Chase & Ca has decided to be the sole investor in its new real estate fund, Junius Real Estate Partners, itself, the Wall Street Journal reports.Junius is already active in commercial real estate. It has invested in the development of an equestrian farm in Virginia, acquired a shopping mall in a suburb of Chicago, and bought an hotel portfolio in Ohio, for about USD465m, according to sources familiar with the matter.

39% of European institutional investors are planning to increase the proportion of assets they delegate to external asset management firms, by an average of 5%, in the next 12 months, a Caceis Investor Services and PwC survey undertaken between February and April, of a sample of professionals representing total assets of USD4.5trn, presented Tuesday at the Fund Forum International (“Taking the Reins: A Roadmap for Navigating the Institutional Investors’ Universe,”) has found.Of the survey, 32% are planning to increase the number of asset management firms to which they delegate assets.Currently, institutionals ousource an average of 59% of their assets to external managers, while the practice is much more sidespread at pension funds (69%) than at insurance companies (10%).They outsource an average of EUR553m to each asset management firm. This amount is lower for those who tend to invest in funds (EUR240m) than for those who prefer mandates (EUR809m). At the same time, 52% of investors surveyed use fewer than 10 external asset management firms, in all investor categories combined.When they select external managers, institutional investors, who account for 69% of assets under management in the asset management sector, or EUR12trn, are most swayed by the transparency of the product, followed by performance and expertise, François Marion, CEO of Caceis Investor Servies, said at a presentation of the study. Their level of satisfaction depends on operational strength, independence of verifications of controls and procedures, and the quality of service, the survey continues. As a result, says Marion, the study suggests that investors are not focused solely on performance. However, poor performance is the most popular reason for investors to decide to replace an asset management firm. The other two reasons are high fees and poor quality reporting. These are three areas where asset management firms need to seek to improve.

30% of asset managers will disappear in the next ten years, a survey by KPMG of 25 CEOs in the asset management industry to be published in July, from which Nicolas Griffin, partner, presented a few findings at the Fund Forum International on Tuesday in Monaco, has found. The head of KPMG says that by asset managers, he means both asset management firms, and people working in the industry.This is a result of overcapacity in the sector, and compressing margins, he explained to Newsmanagers at the conference. “That will primarily affect asset management firms which are too large, and those which have a cost/income ratio of 80-90%, a relatively large population,” says Griffin.The KPMG head also predicts that sovereign funds will become full-blown asset managers. He would not be surprised if sovereign funds started buying up asset management firms as soon as next year.

In the past few years, aversion to the equity markets has given rise to an increasing appetite for bond funds in Europe, according to a Lipper study. But that hasn’t worked to everyone’s advantage. An examination of inflows in 2011 finds that a small percentage of funds accounted for a large percentage of inflows. According to Lipper, slightly over 5% of bond funds took on nearly 50% of bond inflows in 2011.This may encourage some managers to launch new strategies to attempt to capture a part of the inflows to the best-selling funds. The number of funds in Europe, however, remains very high, with an increase of about 1,000 in the number of funds in barely a year.

A survey of 21 institutional investors and 25 corporate CFOs (issuers), mostly European, undertaken by the Edhec-Risk Institute and sponsored by Rothschild & Cie, finds that investors consider inflation-linked corporate bonds the ideal instrument to hedge their liabilities, now that government debt is no longer considered an asset safe from the risk of default, in liability-driven investment by pension funds.For businesses, respondents say that inflation-linked bond issues tend ultimately to limit risks for businesses and to increase its share price.

Uffi Real Estate Asset Management (UFFI Ream) on 26 June announced that it has signed a partenrship agreement with Corpus Sireo, a top fund manager in Germany, to provide outsourced asset management with a dedicated team for the French portfolio of a Luxembourg Sicav-FIS investing in Europe. Uffi Ream will manage six office properties for the fund, which are valued at about EUR250m. As a part of these duties, Uffi ream will be responsible for valuation and rental of the properties. With this new management mandate, “Uffi Ream shows its capacity for development beyond its historical profession as a SCPI, in the management of real estate funds for French and foreign institutional managers,” a statement says. Assets under management at Uffi Ream total EUR1.5bn.

In response to criticisms of ETFs, and at the demand of many investors, BlackRock has decided to limit the room to manoeuvre it grants to its portfolio managers, and will now put a ceiling of 50% of the portfolio on the use of securities lending for products sold under the iShares brand, a spokesperson for the US asset management firm has told Reuters, Handelsblatt reports. In the past, the percentage of assets involved in these transactions has been higher than this limit.