Le Conseil d'État a annulé mercredi trois arrêtés pris en 2011 et 2012 qui gelaient les tarifs du gaz ou limitaient leur augmentation, imposant au gouvernement d’appliquer des hausses rétroactives des factures payées par les ménages français. Les ministres de l’Economie et de l’Energie devront prendre de nouveaux arrêtés de fixation des tarifs pour les périodes concernées dans un délai d’un mois, a précisé le Conseil d’Etat.

«L’euro est trop haut par rapport à ce que l'économie européenne est en droit d’attendre», a estimé mercredi le ministre du Redressement productif, Arnaud Montebourg, interrogé lors d’une conférence de presse. «Nous sommes attentifs à cette question qui est débattue au sein de l’Eurogroupe et qui fait l’objet de toute l’attention du président de la République, du Premier ministre et du gouvernement français, a-t-il poursuivi.

La Commission européenne a annoncé le gel de près de 890 millions d’euros d’aide destinées à la construction de routes en Pologne en raison de soupçons d’entente entre les entreprises ayant répondu à l’appel d’offres. Le ministre adjoint chargé du Développement régional, Adam Zdzieblo, a réagi en jugeant cette décision «complètement incompréhensible» et fondée sur des suppositions douteuses. La Pologne est le plus gros bénéficiaire de fonds européens.

L’Union européenne est sur le point d’imposer des droits de douane dissuasifs sur l’acier à revêtement organique chinois, la plupart des Etats membres estimant que Pékin subventionne illégalement ses producteurs, ont déclaré des diplomates européens mercredi. Ce serait la deuxième fois que l’Union européenne imposerait de tels droits à l’encontre de produits chinois subventionnés, les droits en question étant par ailleurs bien supérieurs à ceux du premier cas.

Le produit intérieur brut (PIB) américain s’est contracté de 0,1%, contre toute attente, au quatrième trimestre 2012, en rythme annuel, son premier recul depuis la récession de 2007-2009, dans un contexte de ralentissement de la reconstitution des stocks et de forte baisse des dépenses de l’Etat. Les ventes finales ont progressé moins fortement qu’attendu, de 1,1% (consensus +1,6%) contre 2,4% au troisième trimestre, et les dépenses des consommateurs ont augmenté de 2,2% après une hausse de 1,6% au troisième trimestre, suivant les chiffres préliminaires publiés par le département du Commerce. L’indice des prix de base (« core ») a augmenté de 0,9% au quatrième trimestre (consensus: +1,0%), après une hausse de 1,1% au troisième trimestre.

Legal & General Investment Management vient d’annoncer la nomination d’Aaron Meder au poste de Global Head of Solutions Group.Aaron Meder, jusqu’ici responsable de l’offre de solutions de retraite aux Etats-Unis, prend la succcession de Kerrigan Procter qui devient de son côté Managing Director Annuities.

In the first quarter of this year, Amplégest is planning to launch an international equity fund and a reactive feeder fund associated with Amplégest Multicap, the firm, whose assets under collective and private management have risen to EUR560m, from EUR550m in November, and EUR300m at the end of 2010, has announced.Asset management activities, whose assets total EUR220m, have risen rapidly in the course of the past few years, and 50% of assets are held by instituitional investors. The flexible fund Patrimoine International, launched at the end of December 2012, and managed by Xavier d’Ornellas, manager in the flexible and dedicated fund unit, already has assets of EUR15m as of the end of January.“While 2011 and 2012 were structuring years for Amplégest, the next three years will be years of development and growth in our two professions,” Arnaud de Langautier, chairman of Amplégest since 9 July 2012, says in a statement.

Aston Asset Management, based in Chicago, has renewed the custody, accounting, sub-administration, regulatory administraton and transfer agency mandate which has for the past 16 years been awarded to BNY Mellon Asset Servicing. The mandate covers the 25 funds from the firm, which represent assets of USD12bn.

On 30 January, Telefónica Germany finished its first quarter of listing on the stock market, and two US asset management firms announced that they had entered its capital. T. Rowe Price has acquired 0.47%, while Franklin Templeton Investments has acquired 0.1%, Cinco Días reports. The largest institutional shareholder remains BlackRock, with 3%.

Following the departure of the to co-heads of its emerging market debt team (EUR12bn n assets), Rob Drijkoningen and Gorky Urquieta, and the managers Bart van der Made, Raoul Luttik and Prashant Singh, ING Investment Management has announced that Sylvain de Ruijter has been appointed as director of the boutique. Fondsnieuws reports that the departing members will join Neuberger Berman (USD205bn, of which USD96bn are in bonds). According to other sources, they would set up a hedge fund with the held of an established company. De Rujiter, who has 23 years of experience in asset management, was responsible for the core fixed income strategy at ING IM, which he joined in 2001.Jaco Rouw has also joined the emerging market debt team. He has 19 years of experience in the area of bonds and currencies. He had previously been a senior portfolio manager for currency strategies in he strategy and tactical asset allocation group (STAAG).De Ruijter and Rouw will be responsible for positioning, transactions and day-to-day operational controlling of all emerging market debt funds and mandates, assisted in these various duties by the senior portfolio manager Joep Huntijena (Asia) and Victor Rodriguez (United States).The team includes 23 specialists in bond and emerging market investments. These professionals are based in the Hague, Atlanta, and Singapore.

According to statistics released on 29 January by the Luxembourg investment fund association (Alfi), assets in funds domiciled in the Grand Duchy have reached a record total of EUR2.383trn, an increase of 13.7% in one year, Investment Europe reports.Net subscriptions in 2012 totlled EUR123.1bn, and as of the end of December, there were 3,841 funds, with 43,386 share classes.Marc Saluzzi, chairman of Alfi, says this is a welcome development for Luxembourg, as the investment fund sector represents 8% of GDP and generates 10% of tax revenues.

The ETF market appears to have a bright future ahead of it, according to a survey of 260 professionals at corporate retirement plans in Europe and 41 British managers of actively-managed funds. The study, undertaken by State Street Global Advisors (SSgA) to commemorate 20 years in existence for its SPDR ETFs, finds that 39% of investment professionals at retirement plans in Europe currently have no allocation to ETFs. 29% of them have an allocation to ETFs of 1% to 10% of total assets, while 12% have 10.1% to 20% of assets in their portfolios allocated to products of this type. Exposure to ETFs is expected to increase significantly. In the next five years, 47% of professionals at retirement plans say they are planning to increase their exposure to ETFs, compared with only 1% who are planning to reduce it. 45% are planning to increase their exposure to equity ETFs, and 28% to bond ETFs. In terms of the use these professionals make of ETFs, 53% of respondents say they use them as tactical investments to gain access to specific markets, 17% use them as basic investmnets, and 19% use them as elements in a core-satellite strategy. At British asset management firms, another group which was consulted in the survey, 37% of respondents say that the funds they manage currently include no allocation to ETFs. 42% have 1% to 10% of their assets allocated to ETFs, while 18% have a total exposure of 10.1% to 20%. In the next five years, 42% of respondents say they are planning to increase their exposure to ETFs, while 8% are planning to reduce it. 42% of British respondents say their exposure to equity ETFs is expected to increase by 2018. In terms of exposure to bond ETFs, the percentage is as high as 19%. Among managers, 73% say they use them as tactical investments to gain access to specific markets, while 11% use them as base investments, and 14% use them as elements in a core-satellite strategy. SPDR has EUR252bn in assets under management in over 170 ETFs worldwide.

Nearly seven out of ten pension programmes (69%) expect European governments to take drastic measures to make up the deficits pension funds have built up over the past five years, according to a survey ordered by State Street and undertaken by the Economist Intelligence Unit research team. Governments may introduce compulsory savings mechanisms. 75% of participants in the survey, who include about 150 pension programmes, estimate that the transition to defined contribution regimes will accelerate, and 77% expect the contribution rate to increase in the next five years.

The euro zone crisis provoked a marked change in the landscape for funds in Europe. Bond vehicles saw unprecedented growth in 2012, Morningstar finds in an analysis of the major trends on the European market. Investors placed a record total of EUR176.5bn in these funds in 2012, for their best year since 2007. This change in the behaviour of investors may undoubtedly be interpreted as a sign of a quest for returns as well as an abandomment of European government bonds, which are no longer seen as a refuge asset. The size of these bond investments was exceptional in 2012, with a total equivalent to nearly ten times the total net inflows in the category in 2007 to 2011. With such flows of liquidity which took off in such a short time on sometimes cramped bond markets (such as convertibles), the excellent returns of bond funds in all categories in 2012 may easily be understood. Unlike in the United States, where investors’ interest in bonds dates back to 2007, the attraction of fixed income assets for Euorpean investors is a recent and more sudden trend. Before 2012, inflows in Europe were distributed fairly evenly between bond and equity funds. From 2007 to 2011, equity funds had higher inflows than bond funds, with a total of EUR28.4bn, compared with EUR18.6bn for bonds in the five-year period. This appetite for bond funds in 2012 was undoubtedly favoured by accommodating policies on the part of central banks, both at the short end of the interest rate curve (prime rates of nearly 0%), and unusually, also at the long end (quantitative easing in the USA, and OMT by the ECB). The study finds a wave of popularity of bond funds in the largest Morningstar categories, as 8 of the 10 largest categories in terms of net inflows in 2012 were bond funds. Inflows were driven by the “other bonds” category, a mixed group which includes flexible and target-date bond funds. This group of funds saw net inflows of EUR44.1bn, followed by emerging markets, with net inflows of EUR18.5bn to emerging market equities and EUR15bn for emerging market debt.

Investec Asset Management has apppointed an analyst, Antoon de Klerk, as co-manager of the Alternative UCITS fund for currencies, the Investec GSF EM Currency Alpha, Citywire Global reports. He will manage the fund alongside Werner Grey van Pittius.

Money Marketing reports that Gemini Investment Management last week closed its MOSt India fund, launched in 2010, and managed by Manish Sonthalia deMotilal Oswal Asset Management, due to inadequate asset levels. Assts under management had fallen below USD5m.

The sovereign fund of the government of Singapore (Government of Singapore Investment Corp, GIC) has invested in a mortgage programm which will provide loans to the British commercial real estate sector totalling up to GBP1bn, according to a statement released by Laxfield Capital. Assets under management at GIC total over USD100bn.

The Munich-absed Xaia Investment (formerly Assénagon Crédit Management) on 16 January transferred its four funds, which represent assets of about EUR2bn, to the Universal-Investment platform.Among these products, three are open-ended, the XAIA Credit Basis (LU0418282348), XAIA Credit Basis II (LU0462885483) and XAIA Credit Debt Capital (LU0644385733), for retail shares.The last of these is the only one which remains open to subscriptions, with a front-end fee of up to 3%, and a management commission of up to 1.11%. The withdrawal penalty, currently 0.5%, will be reduced to 0.25% on 30 September. The fund also carries a 20% commission on performance exceeding the hurdle rate (Euribor 3-month + 200 basis points), with high watermark.

S&P Dow Jones Indices on 29 January announced that it has granted a license for the new S&P SMIT 40 index to Commerzbank, to create an equity ETF as part of the ComStage ETF Sicav. The ComStage ETF S&P SMIT 40 Index TRN fund was admitted to trading the same day on the XTF segment of the Xetra electronic platform in Frankfurt (Deutsche Börse), where it becomes the 1,020th product listed. On 28 January, the listings on the XTF segment actually included 1,021 product, which means apparently that two ETFs disappeared in one day.The S&P SMIT 40 index covers the 40 largest firms of South Korea, Mexico, Indonesia and Turkey, the four largest emerging markets in the “Next Eleven” category made popular by Goldman Sachs Asset Management (GSAM).CharacteristicsName: ComStage ETF S&P SMIT 40 Index TRNISIN code: LU0860821874Benchmark index: S&P SMIT 40 Net Total Return EUR IndexTER: 0.60%

David Scammell has left his job as head of fixed income strategies for the UK and Europe at Schroders, Investment Week reports. He had worked at the asset management firm since 2004. His funds will be redistributed among several managers.

Legal & General Investment Management has announced the appointment of Aaron Meder as Global Head of Solutions Group. Meder, who had previously been responsible for the retirement solutions product range in the United States, succeeds Kerrigan Procter, who becomes Managing Director Annuities.

finews.ch reports that Peter Jeggle is becoming the principal manager of the Fisch Bond Value Fund (CH0023966747), whose assets under management as of 28 January totalled GHF128.15m. Jeggli was co-founder in 2003 of Independent Credit View, and joined Fisch one year ago. Fisch is planning to increase the management team for the high yield fund to five people by March. Meanwhile, the principal manager for the fund, Philipp Good, will concentrate on directing the credit team, and on managing the firms’ flagship product, the Fisch Bond Value Investment Grade Fund, whose assets have risen in one year from CHF640m to CHF1.125bn (+75%).

After the United Kingdom and Spain (see Newsmanagers of 14 and 20 December), Schroder has reelased the Schroder ISF EURO High Yield sub-fund of its Luxembourg Sicav Schroder International Selection Fund, or Schroder ISF, in France.The management of the strategy is provided by Konstantin Leidman, who is based in London and is already responsible for the management of the European high yield allocation of the Schroder ISF Global High Yield fund, a vehicle whose asses total over USD4.2bn.Name: Schroder ISF EURO High YieldA (retail) share class: LU0849399786Front-end fee:: 5.26315% (maximum)Management commission: 1 % (maximum)C (institutional) share class: LU0849400030Front-end fee: 1.01010% (maximum)Management commission: 0.60% (maximum)

Amundi ETF has launched an ETF that provides exposure to European non-financial sector shares on NYSE Euronext Paris. The product, entitled Amundi ETF MSCI Europe Ex Financials, replicates the evolution of the MSCI Europe Ex Financials index, which is composed of 330 positions. ISIN code: FR0011340413 TER: 0.30%

Sella Gestion Sgr, the asset management firm of the Banca Sell firm, is launching Star Collection, a fund of funds which invests in the best international asset management firms, FondiOnline reports. The fund will be composed of five sub-funds: mid to long-term euro bonds, diversified emerging markets, global multi-asset class, international bonds, and international equities.

La Française AM has registered two more funds in Finland, in addition to the LFP R2P Global Credit, the Swedish website Fondbranschen reports. The funds are the LFP JKC China Value and LFP JKC Asia Value. The two funds are managed by JK Capital Management, a La Française AM company based in Hong Kong.

Once again, three British asset management firms, the same ones as at the end of September (see Newsmanagers of 12 November) have won the top three spots in the national rankings by Feri EuroRating Services of seven countries: the winners are Threadneedle, Schroders and Aberdeen. The rankings are determined by the proportion of funds rated A or B of the total number of funds rated in each market, which number over 25 for “large” asset management firms, or 8 to 24 funds for “small” firms.Threadneedle finishes first in Germany, Austria, Italy, Sweden (in the 8-24 fund category) and the United Kingdom, second in France, and fourth in Switzerland. For its part, Schroders finishes top in France, and second in Germany, Austria, Italy and the United Kingdom, third in Sweden, and fifth in Switzerland.Aberdeen takes second place among large asset management firms in Switzerland, and fourth in the United Kingdom. It is third among small firms in Austria and Sweden, and fourth in France and Italy, but in each case with levels of funds rated A or B above 60%, meaning with average scores higher than those of the top two in the rankings, although the 77.80% rate Threadneedle achieves in Sweden in the small firm category is hard to beat, except by DNCA Finance in France (88.9%), and First State in Germany, with 87.5%, also in the small firm category.In France, Covéa Finance takes third place among large firms, with 60.7% of funds rated A or B, while Axa IM takes sixth place, with 47.5%, and Lazard Am is seventh, with 46.9%. Among small operators, DNCA Finance, previously cited, finishes ahead of the Groupe le Conservateur (72.7%) and Comgest, as well as ProBTP, in eighth place with 53.3%.

As of the end of December 2012, La Française AM had EUR37.2bn in assets under management, of which EUR27.6bn were in securities, and EUR7.8bn in real estate. The asset management firm, led by Xavier Lépine, last year posted net subscriptions of over EUR1.6bn. Inflows have come in equal measure to securities (EUR800m) and non-public real estate (EUR810m). In 2012, 27% of inflows to the group were outside France, bringing assets under management internationally to over 4% of total assets at La Française AM, a statement says. The asset management firm says that it won “significant tenders” from French and international institutionals last year, for an overall total of over EUR535m. In retail markets, target-date funds, flexible funds and PEA equity funds drove inflows in 2012. For SCPI private real estate funds, La Française AM has posted more than EUR380m in gross inflows, for total assets of EUR6.2bn.

Private equity investor Dyal Capital Partners (managed by Neuberger Berman), which aims to acquire minority stakes (15-20%) in hedge funds reserved for professionals, has recently entered the capital of two such companies, MKP Capital Management and Halcyon Asset Management, Pension & Investments reports.MKP has about USD6bn in assets under management in global macro, credit and fixed income strategies, while Halcyon has USD12bn under management in multi-strategy hedge funds based primarily on credit and distressed assets. Its majority shareholders have agreed to reinvest 80% of net profits from the sale of their shares to Dyal in the firm’s multi-strategy funds, for at least three years.Halcyon is the sixth investment for Dyal, which has already acquired stakes in CFM, MAST, Pinnacle, Scopia and MKP.

Financière de l’Echiquier, a French asset management boutique founded in 1991 by Didier Le Ménestrel, will this morning announce its acquisition of 100% of Acropole AM, a specialist in convertible bonds, Les Echos reports. The firm, founded in 2006 by three former Fortis employees, including its chairman, Jacques Joakimides, now has EUR780m in assets under management. The acquisition price has not been disclosed, but is said to be “reasonable” by Le Ménestrel, and is probably near 3% of total assets under management. Acropole AM had been supported by UFG (which has since become La Française AM), which controlled 14.5% of its capital, Cheyne Capital and Matmut, with 33.5% and 1% stakes. All three are selling their stakes to Financière.