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16/02/2012

AXA: Asset management profits up despite net outflows

Earnings from asset management at the AXA group remained stable in 2011 at EUR3.269trn. Earnings at AXA IM were up 5%, largely due to rising commissions on real estate transactions and performance commissions. Earnings at AllianceBernstein are down 3%, as rising distribution commissions were more than offset by lower management commissions. Operating profits in asset management are up 20% to EUR321m, largely driven by AXA IM due to the non-recurrence of a one-time provision related to a programming error at AXA Rosenberg in 2010, and rising earnings. Assets under management as of the end of December totalled EUR847bn, down EUR31bn compared with 31 December 2010. Several factors contributed to this development, notably a net outflow of EUR30bn (compared, it is true, with -EUR64bn in 2010), of which EUR28bn were from Alliance Bernstein, largely from institutional clients, including a net inflow of +EUR16bn related to an advising mandate for AXA Japan.
16/02/2012

ING IM recruits a big name from Amundi

Patrick Chia, head of fixed income and currencies at Amundi for the Asia-Pacific region, has been recruited in Singapore as head of Asian fixed income at ING Investment Management. He will be responsible for the Asian bond team and the team handling global emerging market bond management, in cooperation with his colleagues in New York, Atlanta and the Hague.Chia will report to Rob Drijkoningen, co-head emerging market debt, and Grant Bailey, CEO of ING IM for the Asia-Pacific region.
16/02/2012

State Street scales up ties with Canada's Sun Life Financial

The financial services provider Sun Life Financial has announced that it has strengthened its ties with the British arm of the Canadian firm Sun Life Financial [sic], to provide services on assets of over GBP11.5bn. Services provided by State Street include fund valuation, custody, performance measurement, compliance monitoring, OTC valuations, and collateral management.
16/02/2012

AGI to gradually rename RCM funds for retail

Allianz Global Investors has released a calendar to its distribution partners for name changes to 106 of its RCM funds, aimed at retail clients, while the RCM brand name will be preserved for the institutional market.The name changes will gradually be applied between 29 February and third quarter 2012. Newsmanagers is publishing the ISIN codes of the funds concerned in an attachment, with their current name and future name bearing the Allianz prefix. However, “historic” funds such as Fondak, Concentra and Industria, which were inherited from Adig/Commerzbank, will retain their current names, without the addition of the Allianz prefix.The Allianz prefix will also be added to Pimco funds, where it is not already present. This will be done on 29 February for the Allianz Emerging Markets Bond fund, which will become the Allianz Pimco EM Bond fund.
16/02/2012

M&G leads retail fund sales in UK

For the third consecutive year, the British firm M&G last year led retail sales in the United Kingdom, according to the Pridham report, published by Fundscape. The British asset management firm attracted GBP4.3bn in assets in a year characterised by massive redemptions, particularly from equities. The success of M&G last year was favoured by a taste on the part of investors for bond funds, as two thirds of its gross sales went to fixed income products in fourth quarter. BlackRock takes second place in the rankings, with a total of GBP1.8bn for the year as a whole. In fourth quarter, BlackRock earned inflows of GBP278m, compared with inflows of GBP1.2bn for M&G.
16/02/2012

ESMA launches a consultation on short-selling and CDS

The European securities markets authority (ESMA) on 15 February launched a consultation on ways to outsource transactions for short-selling and certain aspects of CDS. ESMA will submit a report to the European Commission by mid-April 2012 on these issues, which will treat ownership of financial instruments in short sales, methods of calculating a net short position, and notification thresholds to apply to short positions on sovereign debt. The consultation will remain open until 9 March, and a hearing on the proposals included in the document is scheduled for 29 February.
16/02/2012

Verazzano Capital soon to launch two hedge funds

Verazzano Capital, founded in France in October last year and licensed by the AMF in January, led by Guillaume Rambourg, former star hedge fund managers from Gartmore, is preparing to release two long/short equity funds in early March: Verazzano European Opportunties and Verazzano European Focus, Agefi reports. The funds will be based in Ireland. The former will be a low volatility fund, while the second will be more aggressive, with maximum leverage of 250%. Rambourg is hoping to reach USD500m in assets by the end of April. In the mid-term, the asset management firm is hoping to raise USD1.5bn, at which time it will hold a soft closing, the newspaper reports.
16/02/2012

Paulson has sold off a lot of shares in SPDR Gold Shares

According to an SEC filing, the hedge fund manager John Paulson sold off 3 million shares in the SPDR Gold Shares fund in fourth quarter 2011, for an estimated total of USD600m, Handelsblatt reports. As of the end of December, Paulson & Co held 17.3 million shares in the fund. It had already sold off one third of its position in third quarter.The transactions may have been to meet redemptions from funds, but it could also be that Paulson is opting for direct investment in gold or gold derivatives, which he is not required to declare.Other investors, however, have subscribed, to the point that the gold stock of the fund increased by 2% in fourth quarter, to 1.25457 tonnes. Among the fund’s more eminent subscribers are George Soros, Pimco and the Teacher Retirement System of Texas.
16/02/2012

Van Eck launches unconventional oil & gas ETF

The Market Vectors Unconventional Oil 7 Gas ETF (acronym on NYSE Arca: FRAK) was admitted to trading on 15 February. Van Eck Global says it is the first ETF listed in the United States to offer investors pure play exposure to new energies such as coal seam gas, shale gas, and shale oil.The new fund replicates the Market Vectors Unconventional Oil & Gas Index, which as of the end of January included shares in 43 companies.Management commission is limited to 0.54% until at least 1 May 2013.
16/02/2012

Three firms lost more than 50% of inflows in January

With the rebound on the markets observed in January, long-term mutual funds (meaning all mutual funds excluding money markets) have posted a net inflow for the month of nearly USD34bn, MutualFundWire reports. According to the most recent statistics from Morningstar on fund flows, 54.36% of these inflows were absorbed by only three actors: Vanguard, with USD13.55bn (39.94% of the total), JP Morgan, with a total of USD2.53bn (7.47%), and DoubleLine, with USD2.36bn (6.95%).
16/02/2012

Hedge funds may attack Spanish banks again

Following the examples of France, Belgium and Italy, Spain’s CNMV has withdrawn a ban on short-selling of financial sector shares as of 16 February, which will allow bearish hedge funds once again to bet against Spanish financial sector groups such as Santander and BBVA, Cinco Días reports.The protected shares had included Banca Cívica, BBVA, Banco Sabadell, Banco de Valencia, Banesto, Pastor, Popular, Santander, Bankia, Bankinter, Caixabank, CAM, Catalana de Occidente, Mapfre, BME and Renta 4.The CNMV is maintaining a requirement that short positions totalling over 0.2% of capital in a publicly-traded business be notified.
16/02/2012

Hedge funds: Bridgewater is the big winner in 2011

Hedge fund managers had a dark year in 2011. Only a minority managed to remain in positive territory, according to annual rankings by Bloomberg Markets magazine covering the year up to 31 October, Les Echos reports. Of the top 100 hedge funds, only 1 out of 5 managed to make returns of over 10%. Bridgewater was the big winner of the 2011 vintage, as the fund, founded by Ray Dalio, not only made the largest gains in the industry thanks to its very good perfomance, but also become the largest hedge fund in the world, with nearly USD80bn in assets, overtaking Man Group.
16/02/2012

Money market funds: managers resist SEC proposals

Fund managers and subscribers rarely agree, but the SEC has managed to show them their common ground, with proposals to limit immediate redemptions to 95% or 97%, when a client wants to liquidate all assets in a money market fund, while the remainder would be payable only 30 days later, the Wall Street Journal reports.Fidelity, which manages USD433bn in money market funds, has undertaken a survey of retail clients: 23% say that they would no longer invest in money market funds, if 3% of their investment could not be redeemed for 30 days.The Investment Company Institute is concerned that the measures proposed would force some managers to close their funds. Federated Investors, which manages USD250bn in money markets, has already announced that it will be suing the SEC if the new regulations damage its business.
16/02/2012

Good performance for hedge funds in January

HFR estimates that the performance of hedge funds in the first month of the year has been 2.63%, while Hennessee estimates the figure at 2.51%, and Lyxor puts it at 1.30%. BarclayHedge, for its part, reports that the 1,671 funds which have released results as of 15 February gained an average of 2.98%. Only the four equity short bias funds showed losses, averaging 10.48%. However, equity long bias (223 funds) has gained 4.93%, while emerging market strategies (280 funds) have gained 4.47%.
16/02/2012

La justice américaine sanctionne Pentagon Capital Management

Suite à l’ouverture d’une procédure par la Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), le juge Robert Sweetde la cour de justice deManhattana infligé une sanction financière de 76,8 millions de dollars au fonds d’arbitrage britannique Pentagon Capital Management ainsi qu'à son directeur général, Lewis Chester, pour des fraudes sur des opérations de trading réalisées par le groupe.
16/02/2012

Credit Suisse lève un fonds de 2,9 milliards dans le secondaire

CS Strategic Partners, branche de Credit Suisse dédiée au capital investissement secondaire, a annoncé la levée d’un fonds de cinquième génération, pour un montant de 2,9 milliards de dollars (2,2 milliards d’euros). La banque helvétique et l’équipe d’investissement de CS Strategic Partners ont apporté plus de 87 millions de dollars à ce véhicule. Le fonds totalise déjà 500 millions de dollars d’investissements ou d’engagements via plus de trente opérations.
16/02/2012

TPG courtise Billabong

Billabong International a demandé aujourd’hui une suspension de cotation à Sydney. Le fabricant textile dédié aux sports de glisse a selon Bloomberg reçu une offre de rachat de la part de la société de private equity texane. L’offre représenterait une prime de 68% par rapport à la clôture d’hier, pour un montant total de 766 millions de dollars australiens, soit près de 630 millions d’euros.
16/02/2012

Nyse Euronext reprend la main

Deux semaines seulement après l’échec du rapprochement avec Deutsche Börse, Nyse Euronext reprend le chemin de la croissance externe. L’opérateur boursier, sans dévoiler les conditions financières de l’opération, a en effet indiqué acquérir 25% de la société londonienne de courtage Fixnetix. Nyse Euronext a la possibilité d’acheter la totalité du capital dans un délai de trois ans.
16/02/2012

Carlyle vend l'ex-De La Rue Cash Systems à un industriel

Carlyle a reçu de la part du fabricant britannique d’appareils de manutention de cashGlory, une offre d’acquisition ferme de Talaris pour 650 millions de livres. Carlyle Europe Partners IIIavait acquis De La Rue Cash Systems en septembre 2008 pour un montant de 360 millions de livres. Rebaptisée Talaris, la société a accru ses bénéfices de 40% sur la période.
16/02/2012

Les taux restent l'arme de référence de la BCE

Dans un entretien accordé au quotidien, Erkki Liikanen, membre du comité de la Banque Centrale européenne (BCE), estime que les taux d’intérêt restent l’outil de pilotage de la politique monétaire le plus important, suggérant que les autres outils n’avaient pas vocation à perdurer. «Les taux d’intérêt restent notre instrument le plus important». Et d’ajouter que «les autres mesures restent seulement le temps qu’elles seront nécessaires» et que la BCE devraient en sortir «dès que les conditions le permettront». Erkki Liikanen évoque même également la possibilité de baisser les taux directeurs sous le seuil de 1% si nécessaire.
16/02/2012

UBS sanctionne des traders à Zurich

Selon des sources proches de l’enquête citées par le quotidien, UBS aurait suspendu de leurs fonctions des traders à Zurich en lien avec l’enquête actuelle des autorités concernant des soupçons de manipulation des taux interbancaires comme le Libor. Certains traders auraient été sanctionnés dès l’an passé, d’autres le mois dernier seulement.
16/02/2012

Un nouveau hedge fund se lance à Paris

Guillaume Rambourg, ancien gérant star de Gartmore, va lancer début mars les deux fonds de sa société, Verrazzano Capital, installée à Paris et agréée par l’AMF. Il détaille pour L’Agefi les objectifs de ce qui s’annonce comme l’un des plus gros lancements du secteur en 2012.
16/02/2012

La zone euro en berne fin 2011

Sur un an l’activité a progressé de 1,5% mais l’Italie, le Portugal et l’Espagne ont vu leur croissance reculer significativement au quatrième trimestre.

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