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24/03/2010
Fonds

Deka fait enregistrer un fonds d'actions russes

Jeudi 18 mars, l’allemand DekaBank a fait enregistrer par la CNMV, pour une commercialisation en Espagne, son fonds d’actions russes Deka-Russland (82 millions d’euros d’encours), un produit de droit luxembourgeois lancé en novembre 2009 (lire notre dépêche du 5 janvier 2010). L’objectif est de surperformer l’indice MSCI Russia 10/40 net return.
Fonds
24/03/2010

Barclays Wealth recrute chez Merrill Lynch

Le nouveau patron du segment particuliers très haut de gamme (UNHWI) de Barclays Wealth pour l’Espagne sera Santiago Durán de la Colina, qui était first vice president, investments, chez Merrill Lynch jusqu'à la semaine dernière.Barclays Wealth España affiche un encours de 8,3 milliards d’euros et emploie 125 personnes dans douze agences. Cette division couvre Warclays Wealth Managers España, qui gère 85 sicav.
24/03/2010

Oppenheimer nomme un responsable Asie

La firme d’investissement Oppenheimer & Co vient de nommer Steve Bernstein au poste de senior managing director pour l’Asie, ainsi que chief executive de la filiale Oppenheimer Investments. Basé à Hong Kong, sa mission sera de développer la clientèle et les revenus de la société dans la région.Steve Bernstein couvre la zone asiatique depuis 1983. Il a travaillé 23 ans pour Citigroup, dont cinq ans au Japon.
24/03/2010

F&C dépose son offre pour C-Quadrat

Au 22 mars, le britannique F&C Asset Management a déposé officiellement son projet d’OPA à 12,50 euros par action sur le gestionnaire autrichien C-Quadrat, ce qui valorise la société à 54,5 millions d’euros (lire notre Depeche du 10 mars). La Commission des prises de contrôle (ÜBK) a maintenant un délai de 12 à 15 séances boursières pour étudier cette offre.
23/03/2010

DB Funds and Hermes launch two commodities products

With the DB Enhanced Beta Commodity Fund (LU0468536874) and DB Hermes Enhanced Absolute Return Commodity Fund (LU0468535397), Deutsche Bank DB Funds and Hermes Investment Managers are offering two Luxembourg-registered funds which comply with UCITS III, and are aimed at institutional investors. The compartments of the DB Platinum Sicav, which exist in Euro-hedged and US dollar versions, are based on the DJ-UBS Commodity and Deutsche Bank Hermes Commodity Absolute Return indices, respectively, as their benchmarks. Both products offer daily liquidity. In both cases, Hermes defines the strategic allocation to 25 commodities in the following month, while Deutsche Bank is in charge of deploying this strategy via commodity futures. The Absolute Return fund aims for performance which is uncorrelated with the evolution of commodities indices overall, while the Enhanced Beta is seeking to outperform its benchmark index.
23/03/2010

Guggenheim Partners acquires LBBW Secs

Guggenheim Partners LLC has announced the acquisition for an undisclosed amount of LBBW Securities LLC, the broker-dealer affiliate of the German Landesbank Baden-Württemberg (LBBW). The transaction will be completed in early April, once regulatory approval has been granted by Finra. LBBW Securities, founded in 2007, is specialised in repos and securities lending. LBBW will retain its New York offices, to serve German businesses in the United States and Canada, as well as for transactions in the area of commercial real estate financing in the United States.
23/03/2010

Matthieu Bucaille takes over as CFO at Lazard Ltd

The Lazard group yesterday announced that the deputy CEO at Lazard Frères Banque in Paris, Matthieu Bucaille, will become CFO for the group as a whole from 1 April 2011. Bucaille, 50, who has been a partner since 1998, will succeed Michael Castellano on his retirement at the end of March 2011. He will immediately become a member of the general board of directors at Lazard Ltd., and will work in collaboration with president and CEO Kenneth Jacobs.
23/03/2010

JP Morgan Chase wants into ETF market

Investment Week reports that JP Morgan Chase has applied to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) with the goal of launching passive and active ETF funds. The passive ETF range will include a product which tracks a total return index, including fixed-rate IG municipal bonds.
23/03/2010

Liquidnet counting on MiFID for European development

Les Echos reports that the US bloc trading platform Liquidnet has enjoyed growing success with global institutional investors. Its management is predicting that the MiFID directive will be revised, particularly the chapter on dark pools, which will strengthen the business’ prospects in continental Europe.
23/03/2010

KBL enters Spanish market

Though KBC is about to sell KBL, the latter firm is moving into the Spanish market, Expansión reports. KBL has even recruited two top managers in the sector: Rafael Grau, former CEO of Banco Urquijo, as well as Riva y García and Iñigo Colombo, former chief investment officer at Fonditel, the manager of the Telefónica pension fund.
23/03/2010

Profits down again at EFG International

Despite very strong growth in second half, and net profits tripled over the previous year, EFG International has seen a contraction of 54% to its net profits in 2009, to CHF101.1m, and its cost-income ratio has deteriorated to 79%, from 65.4% in 2008 (see Newsmanagers of 25 February 2009). Assets under management increased 14% to a total of CHF87.7bn as of the end of December. Assets under management and administration totalled CHF97.1bn, compared with CHF86bn twelve months previously. Net subscriptions from retail clients totalled CHF8.7bn, but total net inflows, following net outflows from institutional hedge funds, totalled CHF6.3bn. The number of customer relationship officers (CROs) fell 10% to 650 as of the end of the year; despite the “highly selective” recruitment of 94 people. EFG International prioritizes quality over quantity. Performance requirements have been raised, and new advisers are required to contribute to profits by the end of their first year.
23/03/2010

Allfunds creates a special category for absolute return funds

Due to growth in demand, Allfunds Bank (Santander and Intesa Sanpaolo) has decided to create a special category of absolute return funds, subdivided into fuor risk profiles (high risk, moderate risk, low risk, and miscellaneous), based on Value at Risk (VaR), Funds People reports. The range currently includes 10 funds with high risk, 10 with moderate risk, 10 with low risk, and 8 funds in the “miscellaneous” category.
23/03/2010

Icap closes cash equities activities

Les Echos reports that the British inter-bank brokerage specialist Icap has announced the closure of its “agency” services for cash equities, including research, in Europe and Asia. The department, which generated losses of GBP25m in the fiscal year to the end of March, had 114 employees, who will be either transferred or laid off.
23/03/2010

Axa IM plans to launch a US high yield bond fund

Axa Investment Managers is planning to launch an onshore version of a US high yield bond fund managed by Anne Yobage, a senior portfolio manager based in Connecticut, in May. The product is based on the US Short Duration High Yield sub-funds of the Luxembourg Sicav from the management firm, which was launched in April 2004, with assets of USD4.1bn. Yobage will be backed up by an 18-person bond team led by Hannah Strasser, which manages total assets of USD38.8bn.
23/03/2010

ETP returns not to be expected

Barclays Capital, Deutsche Bank, Julius Baer, UBS and Amundi launched 45 commodity ETPs in the first two months of 2010, according to figures from Deutsche Bank, compared with 66 such launches across Europe in the whole of 2009. The launches come after assets under management in European commodity ETPs surged 145 per cent to EUR21.2bn in 2009, according to Deutsche. However, investors in these products are, more often than not, receiving substantially worse returns than those of the underlying spot commodity prices.
23/03/2010

Comeback for Mubadala with positive results in 2009

The sovereign wealth fund Mubadala Development Co of Abu Dhabi, which holds stakes in Ferrari and Gneral Electric, among others, has announced a net profit for 2009 of AED8.6 (USD2.34bn), compared with losses of AED19.8bn in 2008, the Wall Street Journal reports. Revenue nearly doubled to AED13.1bn, and total assets increased by 75%, to AED88.5bn.
23/03/2010

Skandia launches corporate bond fund

Skandia Investment Group on 22 March announced the launch of a corporate bond fund rated investment grade, which comes as an addition to the range of single manager products based in Dublin. Skandia has contracted out the management of the fund, which will aim to participate in spreads on corporate bonds, to the institutional asset management firm Wellington Management. The manager of the fund will be permitted to diversify his portfolio with other debt instruments, including MBS, convertible bonds, and high yield bonds, but only up to a maximum of 30%. The fund will be based on the Barclays Capital Global Aggregate Corporate Index as its benchmark.
23/03/2010

Olympia launches a fund of hedge funds

Olympia Capital Management has launched a multi-strategy fund of funds based in Luxembourg, entitled Olympia Dynamic Fund, based on a dynamic allocation determined as a function of risk profiles. The fund uses a core-satellite approach based on an in-house indicator, the Olympia Rick Indicator. The core and satellite elements are actively managed. The core portfolio is invested in hedge fund trackers, while the satellite portion is invested in managed accounts at single hedge funds with a strategic allocation determined on the basis of risk. The fund aims for annualised returns equal to the Libor 1 month + 400bps in the mid-term (three years), with annualised volatility of 6% to 8%.
23/03/2010

UCITS III funds popular with distributors

UCITS III-compliant funds are considered by European and Asian fund distributors as the ideal vehicles to regain the confidence of investors who got out of hedge funds during the crisis. 9)% of 59 fund distribution firms - private banks, family offices, and fund supermarkets - surveyed by KdK Asset Management feel that the potential for sales of an alternative strategy housed in a UCITS vehicle (“Newcits”) is higher than for an offshore hedge fund. The percentage of respondents who think so attains 10)% for countries such as France and Germany. 85% of the same distributors, however, expect UCITS funds to perform sell well then their offshore fund equvalents. The major advantage of these products is their liquidity conditions, according to distributors.
23/03/2010

Italian fund fees hold steady

In 2009, fees for funds on sale in Italy remained stable at 1.28% of total assets, according to a study by Plus24 in partnership with Interactive Data Kler’sInvestOnline. That is equivalent to about EUR2.5bn, half of which winds up in the pockets of distributors. Despite a decline in recent years, the cost of funds remains higher than the average for 448 ETF and ETC products listed on the Milan stock exchange (0.7%). Performance commissions made a comeback in 2009, according to Plus, the money supplement of Il Sole - 24 Ore. Few funds have fees of over 5%, however.
23/03/2010

More than 71% of commissions go to distributors

Of about EUR2bn in commissions, fund management firms which are present in Italy passed on more than EUR1.4bn to distribution networks, according to Plus, the money supplement of Il Sole - 24 Ore. This is equivalent to 71.44% - a decline compared with 73.15% in 2008. Among the firms which are most generous with distributors are three asset management firms controlled by banks, which generally tend to kick back higher portions of commissions than independent management firms. Amundi Sgr pays out an average of 84% of commissions charged, with peaks at 100%. It is followed by Eurizon Capital and Carige AM, at 82% and 81%.
23/03/2010

Launch of DAXglobal Urbanization fund

Since 17 March, Deutsche Börse has been offering the DAXglobal China Urbanization index, which covers the 20 largest and most liquid caps from five sectoral DAXglobal indices. The companies must be listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange (either as H-shares or Red Chips), or on the Singapore Stock Exchange, the New York Stock Exchange, or the Nasdaq. The objective is to bring investors exposure to strong growth in Chinese cities, whose populations are growing by about 13 million people per year. The challenge presented by such dynamic urbanization imply investments in infrastructure, for example, in an increase in housing aupply and the development of urban transport systems, both growth sectors which are included in the new index. The Deutsche Börse states that since 15 March there has been a product from Vontobel based on the Euro-denominated version of the DAXglobal China Urbanization Index, which is available in three currencies (Swiss francs, Euros, and US dollars), in two versions each (PR and TR, for performance and total return).
23/03/2010

Gerhard Ford leaves MLP

The Financial Times reports that Gerhard Fried, a member of the board in charge of acquisitions and product management at the independent financial services provider MLP, is leaving the firm to join HDI-Gerling Privatkunden. He will be a member of the board and head of marketing.
23/03/2010

Results down at DVAG

The financial product distribution network Deutsche Vermögensberatung AG (DVAG) has announced a fall in profits in 2009 of 6.8% to EUR138.8m, on earnings down 10.4% to EUR1.09bn. Last year DVAG recruited 300,000 new clients, bringing the total to 5.4 million. The adviser network from DVAG now has 37,000 members, of whom 16,000 practice as full-time advisers. The network has appointed Reinfried Pohl, founder and chairman of the board, to another five-year term, a statement says.
23/03/2010

IVG to lose head of funds

According to reports in Handelsblatt, Georg Reul, head of investment fund activities at IVG Immobilien, will not stand for another term as a board member, when his current term expires at the end of July. It is not yet known whether his position will be retained. Georg Reul is the last “survivor” from the old management team. His departure comes at a time when president Gerhard Niesslein (who has been in the position since November 2008) would like to restart investment fund activities, which include 33 closed real estate funds with assets of EUR1.6bn (EUR3.3bn including leverage). In addition to these retail products there are institutional funds with assets of EUR12.4bn. But three of these funds, with total assets of EUR2bn, will be closed, as clients are not satisfied. These funds were launched by Oppenheim Immobilien KAG (OIK), which IVG took over more than three years ago.
23/03/2010

KanAm sells two shopping centres

The KanAm US-grundinvest fund (Usd620m), the only German open-ended real estate fund which is denominated in US dollars, has sold its two largest properties, both of them shopping centres. According to sources familiar with the matter, the sales are said to have brought in USD260m and USD300m, USD60m-USD100m less than the declared value of the properties one year ago, Handelsblatt reports. However, the fund has managed to sell the Evening Standard building in Washington for USD180m, and will earn gains on the sale, as the property was on its books with a value of USD140m. The KanAm US-grundinvest has been in a constant redemption freeze since the end of October 2008, and the Munich-based management firm estimates that it will need at least USD200m in liquidity on hand before reopening redemptions.
23/03/2010

Relief rally for health-sector ETFs

The passage of health insurance reforms by the US Congress has resulted in sharp increases for ETF funds focused on the health sector, with the most pronounced impact for the most diversified funds and those focused on pharmaceuticals. At the end of the trading day on Monday, shares in the Vanguard Health Care ETF, the iShares Dow Jones US Healthcare Sector Index Fund and the Health Care Select Sector SPDR Fund were up 0.9%, 0.7%, and 0.7%, respectively, the Wall Street Journal reports. This was probably a relief rally, as the bill has finally been passed, but it remains difficult to say what it will mean for profit margins, says Ronald DeLegge, editor of ETFGuide.com.
23/03/2010

Standard Chartered recruits a head from De AM

Asian Investor reports that Brian Chinappi has left his position as head of acquisitions at RREEF, the specialised affiliate of Deutsche Asset Management, to join Standard Chartered as global head of real estate in Hong Kong, the largest investment platform for the bank. He will begin in his new position in June, replacing richard Johnson, who left the bank in August, following the closure of the bank’s joint venture in real estate with Istithmar World Real Estate, the investment arm of Dubai World. The Hong Kong platform is the dedicated vehicle for all real estate investments in Asia, particularly in China, Hong Kong, India, South Korea and Singapore.
23/03/2010

Promotion at PruPim

Asian Investor reports that Scott Girard has been promoted to the position of chief executive officer at PruPim, the affiliate of Prudential dedicated to real estate investment, replacing Alex Humbly, who will now concentrate on private equity activities of Prudential in Asia. Scott Girard, who joined PruPim three years ago, will continue to serve as chief investment officer for the region. He will be based in Singapore.

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