Compte tenu des recrutements intervenus dans la banque d’investissement et des investissements informatiques, le bénéfice net de la banque privée Berenberg a diminué en 2010 pour atteindre 61,5 millions d’euros contre un record de 65,1 millions d’euros pour l’année précédente.En revanche, grâce à des apports nets d’argent frais d’un montant record, l’encours sous gestion s’est accru de 3,6 milliards d’euros pour atteindre 25,5 milliards.

La gamme de produits Skandia Investment Group disponible en Espagne s’allonge de deux références de la série Skandia Global Funds, avec le Skandia Global Emerging Markets axé sur les marchés émergents et géré par Fisher Investments (lire notre article du 28 septembre 2010), ainsi qu’avec le Skandia Investment Grade Corporate Bond, un fonds d’obligations d’entreprises de qualité investissement, qui est géré par Wellington Management (lire notre article du 30 avril 2010).

Avec le Bankinter Renta Fija 2014 Garantizado, dont la souscription est ouverte jusqu’au 15 mars, Bankinter vient de lancer un nouveau produit obligataire pour lequel il garantit à la fois le remboursement de 100 % du capital au bout de trois ans et un rendement de 10,10 % équivalent à un taux effectif annuel de 3,25 %, précise le communiqué.La commission de gestion sera de 0,20 % et celle de banque dépositaire de 0,10 %. La souscription initiale minimum est fixée à 600 euros.

Avant que la nouvelle du départ de Carl Huttenlocher ne soit rendue publique, Highbridge Capital Management, filiale de gestion alternative de JPMorgan Asset Management, a liquidé pour 1,4 milliard de dollars de positions de son portefeuille d’actions asiatique d’environ 2 milliards de dollars, rapporte Hedge Week.L’intéressé, qui gérait le Highbridge Asia Opportunities Fund ainsi qu’une poche de 8 % du hedge fund multistratégies, se met à son compte et crée un hedge fund.Highbridge a dépêché de New York à Hong-Kong les gérants Alec McAree et Mark Vannacore pour renforcer l'équipe asiatique qui compte environ deux douzaines de personnes.

La société de gestion chinoise Ping An-UOB est sur le point de lancer son premier fonds de placement qui investira de 60 à 95% de ses actifs dans des secteurs surperformants à différents stades du cycle économique.Ping An-UOB se propose de lancer un autre mutual fund d’ici à la fin de l’année.

Plusieurs grandes sociétés de hedge funds basées à Londres transfèrent tout ou partie de leur activité à Malte, en réponse à la fois à la hausse des coûts et au poids grandissant de la réglementation au Royaume-Uni, constate le Financial Times, qui cite Clive Capital, Vector Commodity Management… Malte présente l’avantage de faire partie de l’Union européenne. De plus, avoir un bureau sur l’île est moins cher qu’à Londres et à Genève. Le coût de la vie est aussi plus abordable.

State Street Corporation annonce l’ouverture d’un nouveau quartier général à Sydney en Australie, qui accueillera avant la fin de l’année les 700 employés basés auparavant dans deux bureaux de la capitale australienne. L’objectif est de réunir sous le même toit les activités Global Advisors, Global Markets et Global Services.

Le cabinet indépendant d’ingénierie patrimoniale Equance a annoncé le 3 mars le renforcement de ses équipes avec le recrutement de 60 conseillers en gestion de patrimoine indépendants (CGPI) d’ici à 2013. Un développement ambitieux pour une société qui se présente comme l’un des principaux acteurs de la gestion du patrimoine des Français de l'étranger et comme un acteur alternatif significatif sur le marché français.A l’échelle nationale, Equance développe son réseau plus particulièrement dans la région parisienne et le grand Sud. Les 40 conseillers à recruter représentent trois fois l’effectif actuel. En 2013, le nombre de conseillers dans l’Hexagone atteindra donc 52 personnes. Pour mener à bien ce projet de ressources humaines, Equance vient de nommer un Responsable distribution France Sud, Patrice Dverine, chargé de recruter et de suivre les nouveaux conseillers. « Le développement d’Equance en France s’inscrit dans la continuité de sa stratégie, à savoir privilégier la proximité et l’approche conseil », précise-t-il. A l’étranger, les recrutements de conseillers sont réguliers pour garantir un suivi patrimonial permanent, quelle que soit la zone d’expatriation. Déjà présent dans une quarantaine de pays, Equance entend développer sa présence sur des zones stratégiques où le taux d’implantation de la communauté française est élevé comme l’Afrique francophone, l’Afrique du Sud, les Pays du Golfe, l’Indonésie, l’Inde ou encore l’outre-mer. D’ici 3 ans, le réseau international d’Equance devrait donc compter prés de 60 conseillers.

Le 3 mars, l’EDHEC Risk Institute a annoncé le lancement d’une recherche sur l’utilisation des dérivés de volatité dans la gestion de portefeuille actions. Ce projet va être soutenu par l’entreprise de marché Eurex (Deutsche Börse et SIX Bourse suisse), qui exploite un marché à terme. L’objectif consiste à optimiser l’accès à la prime de risque actions tout en contrôlant le risque de baisse.Le projet est piloté par Stoyan Stoyanov, head of research at EDHEC Risk Institute–Asia et par Lionel Martellini, directeur scientifique du EDHEC-Risk Institute.

BNP Paribas Real Estate, qui comprend six lignes de métier, la promotion, la transaction, le conseil, l’expertise, l’Investment Management et le property management, a dégagé l’an dernier un résultat net avant impôts de 139 millions d’euros, en hausse de 79%, pour un chiffre d’affaires brut en augmentation de 17% à 618 millions d’euros. «2010 aura été une belle année grâce à la pertinence de notre modèle économique et au renforcement de nos positions sur les différents marchés européens», a précisé le 3 mars Philipe Zivkovic, président de BNP Paribas Real Estate. Le dynamisme de la société est notamment lié à l’essor des activités de l’Investment Management. «Le pôle Investment Management est l’un des moteurs de croissance de BNP Paribas Real Estate», a souligné Philipe Zivkovic. L’an dernier, l’Investment Management a enregistré une augmentation de 24% de son chiffre d’affaires brut à 80,8 millions d’euros, dont 58% réalisés en France et 42% à l’international, principalement en Italie. Les actifs sous gestion ont progressé de 1,1 milliard d’euros pour tutoyer les 11 milliards d’euros, dont 4,1 milliards d’euros en France. Depuis 2004, les actifs sous gestion ont été multipliés par trois. Le patrimoine géré devrait poursuivre ce développement en 2011 avec le développement de plusieurs nouveaux véhicules. Présent aujourd’hui dans sept pays (France, Italie, Royaume-Uni, Espagne, Luxembourg, Belgique et Jersey), BNP Paribas Real Estate prévoit d’accroître les actifs gérés «d’au moins 2 milliards d’euros». Outre le nouvel axe de développement que constitue l’immobilier commercial avec 900 millions d’euros d’actifs sous gestion, l’Investment Management a de nombreux véhicules en projet. En France, parmi l’offre destinée au grand public, sont notamment programmés le lancement de la SCPI Pierre Avenir 3, la réouverture du capital de la SCPI Pierre Sélection ou encore la poursuite de l’augmentation du capital sur la SCPI accimmo Pierre diversifiée en immobilier d’entreprise. Du côté des produits destinés aux investisseurs institutionnels, figurent la poursuite du développement de l’OPCI SPF1, le projet de lancement d’un OPCI HPF1 dédié aux maisons de dépendance ou encore le projet de lancement d’un OPCI dédié à la logistique. A l'étranger, BNP Paribas Real Estate continue de se développer sur son principal marché, l’Italie, avec notamment un fonds avec un objectif de 800 millions d’euros pour Fondazione Enasarco. La société entend aussi pousser ses pions au Royaume-Uni, avec un fonds carbone, et en Espagne. En outre, les réflexions sont engagées pour les marchés allemand et néerlandais…

Eaton Vance annonce l’arrivée de Charles G. Turgeon en tant que vice président responsable du développement de l’activité auprès des investisseurs institutionnels et les consultants. Il était auparavant directeur du développement chez Mellon Capital Management.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The CEO of Goldman Sachs, Lloyd C. Blankfein, is reported to have agreed to testify for the US government in the upcoming trial of Raj Rajaratnam, the founder of the Galleon hedge fund, who is accused of insider trading, according to the Wall Street Journal.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The Chinese management firm Ping An-UOB is about to launch its first investment fund, which will invest 60% to 95% of its assets in sectors which outperform at various stages in the economic cycle. Ping An-UOB is also planning to launch another mutual fund by the end of the year.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The range of products from Skandia Investment Group available in Spain has gained the addition of two funds of the Skandia Global Funds series: the Skandia Global Emerging Markets fund, oriented to emerging markets and managed by Fisher Investments (see Newsmanagers of 28 September 2010), and the Skandia Investment Corporate Bond, an investment-grade corporate bond fund, managed by Wellington Management (see Newsmanagers of 30 April 2010).

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Bankinter has launched a new bond product, the Bankinter Renta Fija 2014 Garantizado, for which subscriptions are open until 15 March, for which a redemption is guaranteed of 100% of initial capital plus returns of 10.10% after three years, equivalent to an effective annual rate of return of 3.25%, a statement says. Management commission will be 0.20%, and the depository banking commission is 0.10%. Minimal initial subscription is set at EUR600.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } On 3 March, Morningstar announced the launch of its KIID (Key Investor Information Document) production platform, available over a secure internet connection. The new service is intended to provide management firms and distributors with a simple and complete system to produce, manage and publish their KIID documents. The service is available to all funds domiciled in the European Union included in the Morningstar database.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Fulcrum Asset Management, an independent management firm founded by Gavyn Davies and Anderw Stevens, has received a sales license for Germany for its UCITS-compliant hedge fund Fulcrum Commodity Fund. The product is a UCITS-III compliant version of the Fulcrum Alpha Fund, a global macro quantitative fund which tracks global trends in 24 commodities markets. The fund offers daily liquidity.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } In 2010, in Europe, bond funds were the best-selling products in the asset management sector, with net inflows of EUR126bn, their highest level since 2005, out of total net inflows of EUR170.7bn. The five bond funds which sold best in Europe were the Templeton Global Bond funds, with net subscriptions of EUR13.4bn, the Pimco Total Return Bond (EUR7.8bn), Templeton Global Total Return (EUR6.2bn), Pictet Emerging Local Ccy Debt (EUR4.8bn) and Axa US Short Duration High Yield (EUR4.5bn), according to annual statistics from Lipper (Thomson Reuters). For equities funds, inflows, which were highly slanted towards emerging markets, totalled EUR83.2bn, and the best-sellers were the Templeton Asian Growth (EUR4bn), Aberdeen Global Emg Markets Equity (EUR3bn), Vanguard Emg Markets Stock Index (EUR2.7bn), Carmignac Investissement (EUR2.3bn), and iShares MSCI Emerging Markets (EUR2.1bn). The rankings gives an idea of the asset management firms which earned the largest inflows in Europe: Franklin Templeton, with net inflows of EUR31.4bn, Allianz (EUR20.5bn), and Carmignac Gestion (EUR16.9bn).

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The financial services firm Guggenheim Partners has launched a trading fund, the Guggenheim Global Trading fund, with an initial allocation objective of about USD500m, which may subsequently be increased to USD2bn, Hedgeweek reports. The fund, which will be co-managed by Loren Katzovitz and Patrick Hughes, both managing partners at Guggenheim, are seeking to develop this strategy due to the regulatory need for banks to reduce their proprietary trading activities, and because the smallest hedge funds find the continuation of these activities unprofitable.

New hedge fund launches continued at a steady pace through the end of 2010, as new fund offerings outpaced fund liquidations for the first time since 2007, according to data released by HFR Hedge Fund Research. New hedge fund launches totaled 935 in 2010, topping each of the prior two years and completing the best year for launches since 2007, when nearly 1,200 new hedge funds launched. The fourth quarter saw 220 new funds launched, completing a strong calendar year despite being the second lowest quarterly launch total in the last six quarters. Hedge fund liquidations totaled 743 in 2010, the fewest since 2007 and nearly half of the record calendar year liquidation total of 1,471 set in 2008. The fourth quarter saw only 158 funds liquidate, the lowest total since 4Q07 and only approximately 20 percent of the record total of 778 funds which liquidated two years earlier in the volatile 4Q08. Performance dispersion between the best the worst performing hedge funds also narrowed considerably in 2010 from the staggering levels of 2008 and 2009, with only 58 percentage points of performance separating the average of the top and bottom deciles of hedge fund industry returns for the year. Finally, average hedge fund incentive fees continued to decline, falling to 18.95 percent industry wide, the lowest level since HFR began tracking aggregate industry fee structure; average management fees were unchanged at 1.58 percent.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The financial services group Aragon earned record net profits in 2010 of EUR1.53bn, compared with losses of EUR2.01m in 2009. Assets under administration, which fell to EUR2.1bn as of the end of March 2009, totalled EUR4bn as of the end of 2010, compared with EUR3.8bn one year previously.Earnings increased 57% to EUR109.11m. The objective set by the chairman of the board, Sebastian Grabmaeier, is to top EUR200m by 2014, with a double-digit earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) margin, compared with 3.7% last year.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Due to recruitments in investment banking and IT investments, net profits at the private bank Berenberg fell in 2010 to EUR61.5m, from a record EUR65.1m the previous year.However, due to record inflows of new capital, assets under management increased by EUR3.6bn to EUR25.5bn.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } A study undertaken in autumn 2010 by Family Office Consulting GmbH and iShares, covering 130 German family offices with average assets of EUR1bn, has found that asset classes selected by various actors in the category vary depending on asset volumes. Family offices in the sample which work for a single family, with average assets fo EUR600m, tend to prefer real estate and alternative investments, while wealth managers at banks (EUR1.6bn on average) invest more in bonds. Family offices who fall between the two have average assets of EUR1.3bn.The study also found that in 2010, family offices sought an average pre-tax rate of return of 7.4%; in 2010, their returns were higher than this, at 7.8%.To achieve these high returns, family offices use a relatively high proportion of real estate and alternative investments. The study, of which iShares is one of the authors, finds that more than one quarter of managers surveyed also relies on passive investments. In this category, two third of managers use ETFs, and among those, more than 60% are invested in emerging markets ETFs, while nearly one quarter are invested in high yield bonds.Regardless of the volume of assets under management, the study finds, 70% of family offices prefer physical replication ETFs in order to avoid counterparty risks and achieve higher levels of transparency.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } On 3 March, the EDHEC Risk Institute announced the launch of a research project dedicated to the use of volatility derivatives in equities portfolios. The project will be supported by the Eurex stock market operator (Deutsche Börse and SIX Swiss stock exchange), which operates a futures market. The objective is to optimise access to equities risk premia while controlling underlying risk.The project is led by Stoyan Stoyanov, head of research at EDHEC Risk Institute – Asia, and Lionel Martellini, scientific director of EDHEC – Risk Institute.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } On 3 March, Axa Framlington (EUR23bn in assets as of the end of December) announced the launch on 4 March of the AXA Framlington UK Mid Cap Fund, which will be managed by Chris St John, an addition to the firm’s 19 UK equities products. The portfolio, which will invest in 60 to 80 positions, will be at least 70% exposed to shares of the FTSE 250 index, and a maximum of 15% exposed to the FTSE 100.The fund, which will rely on a macroeconomic (top-down) as well as a stock-picking (bottom-up) approach, will initially be available only to institutional investors, with a management commission of 0.75%, and a minimal subscription of GBP100,000.

Threadneedle is to launch the Threadneedle (Lux) European Smaller Companies Absolute Alpha Fund, a European smaller companies absolute alpha product. The UCITS III fund will give manager Philip Dicken and his team flexibility in strategy and fund positioning. The Threadneedle (Lux) European Smaller Companies Absolute Alpha Fund, which is a regulated UCITS III SICAV fund, will launch on the 3 March 2011. Along side this launch, Threadneedle is updating certain investment vehicles to refine its absolute return range in anticipation of reforms to the way products can be distributed in Europe. Consistent with this and with the new fund launch, the hedge fund Threadneedle European Smaller Companies Crescendo Fund has closed.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The Swiss alternative management specialist Harcourt Investment Consulting has announced that assets under management as of 31 December totalled USD4.8bn, up USD300m for the year 2010. The firm says in a statement that outlooks for 2010 are favourable. It is predicting an increase in assets under management.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } In an interview with Il Sole – 24 Ore, Domenico Siniscalco, chairman of the Italian association of asset managers, Assogestioni, welcomes the recent reforms to the tax regime for Italian-registered funds, which finally places them on a level playing field with foreign-registered funds. “The elimination of this burden does not mean that the race is won, but at least now the possibility exists,” he says. Italian funds are now taxed on capital gains at exit, and not on day-to-day gains. Siniscalco is also positive about the tax regime approved last July, which is now in the process of being passed, according to which European asset management firms (and thus also Italian firms which in recent years moved their domicile to avoid Italian taxation) will be allowed to transfer their headquarters to Italy and receive advantageous tax conditions for a period of three years.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Expansión reports that redemptions of shares in the Santander real estate fund Banif Inmobiliario are being sought after in a resurgence of the war for assets of private banking clients dissatisfied with their experience with the fund. Overall, EUR2.5bn which the fund managed as of the end of February are up for grabs.The most active firm in the race is the Portuguese Espirito Santo, which has extended the deadline to subscribe to its savings accounts with 4.6% returns over 18 months until 10 March.Banco Finantia Sofinloc is offering a savings account paying 4% in one year on savings over EUR50,000, just at the time when the Banif Inmobiliario reopened to redemptions, with returns increasing to 4.25% over 18 months, or 4.5% over 25 months.Banco Mediolanum has reopened its Ahorro Futuro offer, with returns of 4% for 6 or 12 months, but with a requirement to subscribe to another financial product.

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Due to positive currency effects, net subscriptions and gains on equities, assets under management and administration at Rabobank rose by 17% to EUR270bn as of the end of December. Robeco manages about half of these assets, while Sarasin is responsible for one quarter of the total, and the remainder is the province of Schretlen & Co, Rabo Real Estate Group and the local banks of the Rabobank network. All divisions posted an increase in assets, Rabobank reported on 3 March. Net profits for the 2010 fiscal year for the Rabobank group increased 26% ot EUR2.6bn.