An investment industry conference needs to be organized in a playground for the super-rich, in order for a CEO to agree to travel there and stay for the weekend with his wife or mistress. This year, at the Fund Forum in Monaco, things are proceeding much as they did last summer, except that the financial crisis appears to have passed, and the sector is doing well. The only thing missing at the party is investors, Handelsblatt reports. According to a study by Cerulli Associates, net subscriptions in the sector, which manages about USD50trn, are expected to hit USD159bn this year. There are few critics. However, James Broderick, CEO of JPMorgan AM for Europe, says that the sector in Europe has water on the brain, with 38,000 funds, compared with only 8,000 funds in the United States for an equivalent population, which explains why funds are small and expensive.

SEB Asset Management has announced that it has dedicated about EUR20.4m to the acquisition of a 12,650 square metre commercial real estate property located in Munich-Passing. The property will be added to the open-ended real estate fund SEB ImmoPortfolio Target Return Fund (DE00009802314), a product aimed at institutional investors and high net worth retail clients. It will be the 13th German property in the portfolio of the fund, which includes 45 properties in 12 countries. The vendor is MG Grundbesitz Objekt Gleisdreieck Pasing GmbH & Co. KG, an ad-hoc affiliate of the Viennese UBM Realitätenentwicklung AG.

From 1 July 2010, Frankfurt Trust, an affiliate of BHF-Bank, has lowered its management commission by half, to 0.20%, for its money market fund FT AccuGeld. The move comes as a reaction to persistently low interest rates in the Euro zone, in order to allow the fund to remain an attractive receptacle for liquidity, says Karl Stäcker, CEO. The changes will not have any affect on the strategy of the manager, Matthias Bayer, who assigns the top priority to safe investments. Meanwhile, Frankfut Trust has announced that it will be launching two new classes of shares in the FT AccuGeld, including a distribution share class for retail investors (DE000A0YCBQ8) and a capitalisation share class for institutional investors (DE000A0YCBR6) with a minimal investment of EUR250,000.

Morgan Stanley Real Estate Invetment GmbH on Tuesday evening announced that the net asset value of its open-ended real estate fund P2 Value (EUR1.37bn in assets, EUR56m in net liquidity) has been lowered for the fourth time since 13 May (see Newsmanagers of 14 and 28 May and 24 June). This time, it has been reduced by EUR3.51, and the value of a share is down to EUR40.88. The downward revision is largely due to a new estimate of the value of the Itoche Headquarter Building in Osaka, Japan.

The co-CEO of European activities at Tishman Speyer, Eric Adler, will join Pramerica Real Estate Investors, an affiliate of the US firm Prudential Financial, on 1 July, as CEO for Europe. He will be based in London, and will report to Allen Smith, CEO of Pramerica Real Estate Investors, in Parsipanny, New Jersey. In his new role, Speyer will be in charge of investments in western Europe and the emerging markets of central and eastern Europe. He is now responsible for offices in Luxembourg, Paris, Madrid, Lisbon, and Istanbul.

On Wednesday, BNP Paribas Investment Partners (BNPP IP) and the Russian TransKreditBank (TKB) announced that the management firm KIT Fortis Investments (EUR2.1bn in assets as of 31 May) has been renamed TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners (TKB BNP Paribas IP). The 50% stake in the venture previously held by KIT Finance Holding Company will be transferred to TKB by the end of the year, which will transform it into a 50/50 joint venture between BNPP IP and TKB. According to BNPP IP, assets under management at the new TKB BNP Paribas IP have doubled compared with their level before the crisis in late 2007.

The number of women sitting on the boards of directors of CAC 40 companies has leapt from 10.5% in 2009 to 15.3% this year, according to the most recent Capitalcom barometer of gender diversity on CAC 40 boards. In total, of 576 positions for directors in the CAC, 88 are held by women, compared with 29 in 2009, out of 562 positions. The “lady boom” may have been partly propelled by legislation proposed by Jean-François Copé and Marie-Jo Zimmermann, which has been passed by the French National Assembly, and which will soon go to a vote in the Senate, and by recommendations from Afep_Medef, published last April. At any rate, the objective of 20% women on boards of directors within three years has already been achieved at 12 groups (or 30% of the CAC 40), including Axa, BNP Paribas, Crédit Agricole, Dexia, Société Générale, Alstom, Essilor, PPR, and Vivendi, which is the “best of the CAC,” with more than 30% women. The barometer observes that 30 women attained positions on the boards of 28 groups this year, five times more than in 2009. But among these new women, only one represents employee shareholders: Michèle Vilain at Bouygues.

CPB Immobilien KAG (an affiliate of Semper Constantia Privatbank) has announced that the Austrian real estate fund Constantia Real Estate (EUR116m as of the end of March) has once again begun accepting redemptions, from 21 June. Redemptions had been frozen since 22 July 2009. The management firm says that major clients have given firm commitments of their desire to remain invested in the fund for the long term. Since 8 July 2009, the fund has changed managers. The new managers, Detlef Schumacher and Carsten Wirth, spent second quarter adjusting strategy. As of 18 June, net returns from rent since the beginning of the year represented 2.22%, which makes it one of the most profitable products in Austria and Germany, according to the management firm. The average occupancy rate for the 25 properties in the portfolio is 98%.

State Street on 29 June announced the appointment of Andrew Kurizkes as chief risk officer. He will oversee a team of 300 risk professionals worldwide. Kuritzkes, who will take up his new position in August, will report to Jay Hooley, State Street CEO, and will join the Management Committee of State Street. He was previously at Oliver Wyman.

Altarea Cogedim on 30 June announced that on the same day, it signed an agreement to sell 39-41 avenue de Wagram in Paris, home to the 5-star Mariott Renaissance Paris Arc de Triomphe hotel, with 118 rooms and suites, the freshly-renovated Salle Wagram music hall, and 3 home interior shops, to the German open-ended real estate fund Deka-ImmobilienEuropa, for EUR113.8m. The average unit price per hotel room thus comes out at EUR620,000. Mariott will continue to operate the hotel. The Salle Wagram will be managed and operated by Eurosites. Assets in the German open-ended fund totalled EUR10.83bn as of 31 May.

Contrary to what is frequently said about the European ETF market, Valérie Baudson, director of Amundi ETF, argues that the market is still highly concentrated, with only three actors in Europe occupying 75% of the market. Competition remains limited, as many different actors who have arrived in recent years are using a variety of strategies to gain market share. Some have focused on the price of products, for example, while others have relied on product innovation. Amundi ETF, for its part, has chosen to offer attractive fee levels. This “angle of attack” has not exempted Amundi ETF from the need to construct a sufficiently large product range. After systematically covering the French market like a grid, the firm has 89 products on the NYSE Euronext in Paris. But the firm’s vision quickly became European. It now has more than 200 products listed on financial markets in Europe, and has followed a rate of 20 new listings per month since the beginning of the year. In numbers, this growth is already perceptible: according to recent statistics from Deutsche Bank, the Amundi affiliate was in fourth place as of the end of May in terms of net inflows in 2010, with EUR1.211bn, an increase of 27.6% compared with the previous year. With a range of ETF products worthy of the name, and which is set to grow further, Amundi ETF may now integrate a concept of “market timing” into its product release cycle, in order to take advantage of satisfactory market conditions for certain assets. Amundi ETF also aims to innovate or to accommodate the demands of investors, each time with “transparent products that offer excellent liquidity,” Baudson concludes.

Carolyn Lu, who was previously CEO and regional head of business for Asia at Société Générale, has joined Aviva Investors in Singapore as managing director, business development for the Asia-Pacific region. She will report to Erich Gerth, executive director and CEO global business development. She will be based in London, and will work on close collaboration with Craig Bingham, CEO Asia Pacific, who is based in Australia.

Paul Ilott, who was director of communications for the multi-management arm of Fidelity International, has launched a multi-management research institute, Money Marketing reports. Ilott says the increasing sophistication of multi-management has created a specific demand for funds of this type. Scopic Research will provide information and ratings on multi-management funds, and may also execute due diligence or offer custom advising.

HSBC has announced that it has brought together its specialists in asset management activities to form a single brand. Halbis, dedicated to active fundamental management, Sinopia, a specialist in quantitative management, HSBC Liquidity, which is focused on treasury management, and HSBC Multimanager, representing the multi-management activities, will now be united and sold under the brand name HSBC Global Asset Management. Each unit will retain its own investment philosophy and management process within this single brand, the firm says, adding that HSBC Global Management had USD427.3bn in assets under management as of 31 December 2009.

Fidelity Investments on 29 June announced the launch of ETF research tools which will be freely accessible. The tools, “ETF/ETP Screener” and “ETF/ETP Snapshot,” will be available on the Fidelity website from July. They use the same interface as the equities research tools, which have had a good reception from clients, Fidelity says in a statement.

RWC Partners has recruited two bond managers from Threadneedle, Peter Allwright and Stuart Frost. The two bond market experts will manage the RWC absolute return and currency funds, and will monitor the RWC Strategic Reserve fund. RWC has recently recruited two former Schroders managers, who acquired a 49% stake in the capital of the British management firm (see Newsmanagers of 23 June).

In December last year, the French national pension fund, the Fonds de réserve pour les retraites (FRR), selected Standard Life Investments to manage a EUR1bn allocation to investment grade credit, along with five other management firms. This was a triumph for the discreet Scottish management firm, which began to cover the French market only two or three years ago. With another mandate which it has recently won, but which has not yet been assigned, the firm’s assets for French clients now total about EUR300m. In addition to mandates from institutionals, Standard Life Investments serves fund of fund clients, with 10 sub-funds housed in its UCITS III-compliant Luxembourg Sicav. The Sicav has not yet been licensed for sale in France, but this may be expected to be achieved soon. The management firm is planning to do so next year, in order to step up its development in France, though for the moment it is not planning to target the retail segment, says Phil Barker, head of pan-European sales at Standard Life Investments, in Monaco. The registration will not necessarily include all the funds in the range, but only the sub-funds which may be expected to interest French investors most, such as the corporate bond funds, one of the specialties of Standard Life Investments. In France, Standard Life relies on Jill Shaw, who also serves Switzerland. For the moment, she is based in Scotland. The opening of a French office is not currently planned, but it may be a possibility if activities develop. Standard Life Investments is present in Paris with a research office for real estate, an asset class which may be an axis of development in France. The other areas of expertise that Standard Life Investments is planning to foreground are socially responsible investment (particularly in corporate bonds), equities in specialised segments such as small caps, and high alpha.

La Tribune reports that a proposed banking tax which would have brought in USD19bn in tax revenue for the US government has been buried. Barack Obama had claimed that the tax would bring in not USD19bn, but USD117bn over the next ten years. Two other sources of financing have been found. One of them, for USD11bn, will be the early cancellation of the TARP program. The other, for USD5.7bn, will be an increase in commissions paid by major banks to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). The contributions, currently 1.15%, will be increased to 1.35%. Banks with less than USD10bn in assets will be exempted.

Invesco PowerShares Capital Management has acquired a license for the new StockInvestor Core index, which reproduces a diversified equities portfolio drawn from the Hare and Tortoise portfolios made popular by the StockInvestor newsletter from Morningstar. The portfolios include high-quality shares which are trading far below the estimations of Morningstar analysts. The StockInvestor Core Index will serve as the new benchmark for the PowerShares Value Line Industry Rotation Portfolio ETF, which will now be known as the PowerShares Morningstar StockInvestor Core Portfolio. The product is traded on the NYSE with the acronym PYH.

Axa Rosenberg Group, which in mid-April belatedly admitted that a coding glitch had been detected and corrected last year, on Wednesday announced that Barr Rosenberg, one of the founders of the business, has resigned from the board, and that Thomas Mead has quit his job as director of research and board member, the Wall Street Journal reports. Both men “acted to limit the dissemination of information” about the software problem. Meanwhile, Agustin Sevilla has resigned from his position as global CIO, in favour of a “senior research role.” He did not “act in a manner in keeping with the house policy” in connection with the problem, the firm says. Assets under management by Axa Rosenberg have fallen to USD41bn as of the end of May, compared with USD62bn two months earlier. Charles Schwab will liquidate its four Laudus Rosenberg funds, which were closed to subscriptions in the weeks following the announcement of the problem.

The US investment boutique Aladdin Capital has recruited Kenneth Innes for the newly-created position of global head of sales. Aladdin, who will supervise the entire Aladdin distribution network, will be a member of the executive board. Innes previously worked at Forum Partners, where he was head of sales and marketing.

On the fund’s fifth birthday, Marc Girault, CIO for HMG Finance, announced that the HMG Globetrotter fund has reached EUR85m in assets as of 29 June, compared with EUR73.5m as of 31 May, with a performance of 4.1%, compared with 0.1% for the benchmark index, the MSCI World. The fund invests in affiliates of European companies in emerging countries, or in European companies whose activities are largely in emerging countries (see Newsmanagers of 21 June). Meanwhile, the heads of HMG Finance have announced that separate analysis tools have been created for each fund in the range, which will allow them to better serve institutional investors, by providing them with more detailed performance contribution statistics. HMG Finance, which has brought its sales and marketing within the firm, is planning a drive in the IFA and private banking markets. The management firm is also considering a potential international expansion, though there are no concrete plans at present.

La BCE leur a prêté hier 131,9 milliards d'euros à 1 % sur 3 mois, moins qu'attendu

La BCE leur a prêté hier 131,9 milliards d'euros à 1 % sur 3 mois, moins qu'attendu

La BCE vient de publier ses recommandations visant à «renforcer la gouvernance économique de la zone euro». La Banque centrale européenne se lance donc dans la politique; la nouvelle est de taille, mais elle ne doit pas surprendre.

NewAlpha a annoncé, mardi 29 juin, la signature de son quatorzième partenariat d’incubation avec la société G Capital Management, LLC via un investissement de 25 millions de dollars dans son principal fonds. G Capital Management met en oeuvre une stratégie Global Macro discrétionnaire sur les taux d’intérêt, les devises, les matières premières et les indices actions des pays développés, précise le communiqué de la société.

Désormais, le «tierces parties marketing» (TPM) Investeam a atteint les 450 millions d’euros intermédiés, au profit de 61 clients distributeurs, grâce à 15 produits de cinq sociétés de gestion, comme l’ont indiqué à Newsmanagers Frédéric Smith et Didier Jug, deux associés de la société française. Investeam cherche à compléter son offre, et manque notamment encore d’un fonds asiatique ou japonais émergeant du lot, voire d’un fonds africain ou d’un fonds Maghreb.La société «parente» au Canada a intermédié environ 400 millions de dollars canadiens et Didier Jug nous a précisé que des pourparlers ont été engagés en vue d’ouvrir des bureaux en Espagne, en Allemagne, à Singapour et au Brésil.Le dernier-né du catalogue est un fonds d’actions de sociétés aurifères, un produit canadien géré sous forme de compartiment d’une sicav luxembourgeoise par Robert E. Cohen, de Goodman & Company (groupe Patrimoine Dundee ou Dundee Wealth). Le compartiment en question, Dynamic Precious Metals Fund (LU0357130771), n’affiche pour l’instant que 32 millions d’euros d’encours, car Dundee Wealth (38,1 milliards de dollars sous gestion et 25,2 milliards sous administration) a jugé inutile de fournir un amorçage pour un produit qui fonctionne très bien au Canada et aux Etats-Unis.En effet, le produit européen affiche au 31 mai une performance de 121,27 % depuis le 6 mai 2008, alors que le S&P/TSX Global Gold Index en euros ne gagnait que 43,24 %. Sur les cinq premiers mois de l’année, le fonds signe une performance de 33,24 % contre 26,65 pour l’indice de référence.Ce fonds de «forte conviction» (40 lignes) géré par une maison de spécialistes du monde minier venus à la finance affiche un très faible taux de rotation de 20 % et se spécialise sur des valeurs (à 65 % des titres cotés à Toronto) très peu connues comme Osisko Mining, San Gold ou Red Back, sans aucune méga-capitalisation. Les dix premières positions représentent 55,2 % du portefeuille (contre 72 % pour le modèle canadien). Robert Cohen précise que le fonds est investi à 65 % dans des producteurs, 25 % dans des sociétés de développement et à 10 % en sociétés d’exploration/prospection. Bien entendu, le gérant suit de près aussi les opérations de fusions acquisitions dans le secteur, et s’efforce d’en tirer le meilleur parti.Il est intéressant de noter que, sur la période de dix ans au 30 avril 2010, l’exposition du fonds canadien à la hausse de l’or en dollars américains a été de 560,8 % pendant qu’elle se limitait à 155,8 % à la baisse.

L’agence Fitch a annoncé le 29 juin qu’elle retirait la notation «M1» attribuée à Natixis Asset Management pour la gestion de CDO synthétiques en catégorie d’investissement.

L’assemblée générale mixte des actionnaires d’OFI Private Equity Capital, réunie le 28 juin, a voté et adopté l’ensemble des résolutions présentées par le gérant, OFI Private Equity, à l’exception de la 22ième résolution relative à l’émission d’actions réservée aux salariés. L’assemblée générale a notamment approuvé les résolutions relatives à l’affectation du résultat et la distribution de dividendes. En conséquence il revient aux actionnaires un dividende de 0,27 euro par action. Ce dividende sera payé en numéraire à compter du 6 juillet 2010 et au plus tard le 8 juillet 2010. Par ailleurs, l’assemblée aénérale a approuvé la nomination de la Matmut au Conseil de Surveillance et celle de la MAIF et de l’UMR aux fonctions de censeur.

Se jugent désormais «incontournable» sur le créneau des CGPI, Skandia France a importé au bout de 18 mois d'étude un concept pratiqué avec 26 grandes banques partenaires en Italie. Le concept Skandia Labels s’adresse à des sociétés de gestion, des banques privées et des départements de gestion privée. Il s’agit d’une offre, complète, modulable, personnalisable et labellisable pour satisfaire les besoins de la clientèle patrimoniale, qui pourra aussi faire appel aux ressources de Skandia Investment Group.L’ambition de l’assureur, qui fournit la plate-forme techique et les interfaces dans le cadre d’une offre en architecture ouverte et sur mesure, consiste à capter -sans l’acheter, insiste le CEO Hein Donders- en trois ans une part de 5 % du marché qui représente actuellement environ 10 milliards d’euros.Pour gérer «Labels» en accompagnant les nouveaux partenaires (dix ont déjà adhéré à cette offre), Skandia a constitué une équipe dédiée. A la tête de cette nouvelle direction commerciale, Skandia a nommé Anne-France Gauthier (ex Métropole Gestion) - cf Newsmanagers du 08/06/10.