Le budget 2012 de la France est bâti sur des hypothèses peu réalistes
Présenté le 28, le projet de loi de Finances table encore sur une croissance de 1,75 %, près du double des prévisions de certains économistes
Euro Stoxx 50 : le risque baissier domine encore mais avec un faible potentiel
La correction baissière enclenchée en février dernier à 3.075 points est vraisemblablement entrée dans sa dernière phase
Le FMI appelle la BCE à la rescousse
Lors de son assemblée annuelle, le Fonds monétaire international a estimé que la Banque centrale européenne était le seul acteur en mesure d’effrayer les marchés. Mais l'éventualité de voir la BCE plus fortement impliquée ne fait pas l’unanimité, en particulier du côté de Berlin.
L'euro chute après la réunion du G20 à Washington
L’euro reculait ce matin de 0,5% contre dollar à 1,3429 et de 0,6% contre le yen à 102,57, à une encablure de son plus bas depuis 10 ans
LCH.Clearnet à l’heure des choix
Le conseil d’administration de la chambre de compensation devrait se réunir aujourd’hui même afin d’entériner un choix de reprise entre les offres rivales formulées par le London Stock Exchange et Markit, selon le quotidien. D’autres prétendants se sont manifestés pour faire équipe au sein des deux offres existantes. La Bourse de Singapour, SGX, serait ainsi sur les rangs. Le Times a rapporté que les banques d’investissement propriétaires de LCH.CLearnet, parmi lesquelles Goldman Sachs ou Morgan Stanley, font pression auprès de l’opérateur de la Bourse de Londres pour qu’il garantisse un plafond sur les commissionspour une période pouvant aller jusque cinq ans.
« La BCE a une marge de manœuvre assez considérable pour les achats de titres »
Eric Bourguignon, directeur général délégué de Swiss Life AM (France)
Francisco Partners prend le contrôle d'eFront
Via un véhicule d’acquisition contrôlé par des entités affiliées, le fonds de capital investissement vient d’acquérir la totalité du capital d’eFront, éditeur de solutions logicielles dédiées aux métiers de la finance. Le prix d’acquisition de 18 euros par action correspond à une valeur des capitaux propres d’environ 68 millions d’euros sur une base totalement diluée.
L'AMF étudie le classement des OPCVM en équivalent de trésorerie
Dans une note, l’Autorité des marchés financiers estime que pour les deux catégories d’OPCVM qui bénéficient de la présomption d'éligibilité (monétaire et monétaire court terme), une vérification régulière de la performance historique est importante pour confirmer le caractère négligeable du risque de variation de valeur. Pour les autres OPCVM, l’AFM juge impératif de mettre à jour l’analyse des 4 critères (placement court terme, très liquide, facilement convertible en un montant connu de trésorerie et soumis un risque négligeable de changement de valeur).
L’Asie séduit toujours les gérants alternatifs
Selon une enquête d’AsiaHedge, trois-quarts environ des actifs des hedge funds spécialisés sur l’Asie (145 milliards de dollars à fin juin, en repli de 5% sur le semestre écoulé) sont gérés depuis cette zone, contre 60% environ il y a trois ans. Hong Kong a renforcé ces derniers mois sa position de force en la matière, en s’arrogeant la domiciliation de plus d’un quart des fonds concernés.
Entreprises et ménages français ont le moral au plus bas
Plombés par la crise de la dette, la baisse des marchés financiers et les craintes d’un ralentissement mondial de l’activité, le climat des affaires et le moral des ménages en France se sont fortement dégradés en septembre, ce qui augure mal de l'évolution de l’investissement et de la consommation. Les enquêtes de l’Insee confirment une évolution qu’avaient déjà ébauchée jeudi les premiers résultats des enquêtes mensuelles PMI de Markit et confortent le scénario d’une croissance au mieux faible au second semestre après la stagnation du printemps. L’indice général du climat des affaires en France a reculé de huit points à 97 et retombe sous sa moyenne historique de 100. La situation n’est pas meilleure du côté des consommateurs: à 80 en septembre, l’indice de confiance des ménages calculé par l’Insee chute à son plus bas niveau depuis février 2009. Le détail de l’enquête traduit notamment un accès de pessimisme sur le niveau de vie et l’emploi.
Le fonds FFP prend 10,1% de l'actionnaire principal d'Ipsos
La société d’investissement FFP a pris 10,1% de LT Participations, holding des fondateurs du spécialiste d'études de marché Ipsos, à l’issue de l’augmentation de capital lancée par celui-ci en septembre pour financer son acquisition du britannique Synovate. FFP, détenue majoritairement par les Etablissements Peugeot Frères et dirigée par Robert Peugeot, précise dans un communiqué investir 22 millions d’euros.
La décote sur les obligations grecques pourrait dépasser les 21%
La décote que les investisseurs privés ont accepté de passer sur les titres de dette souveraine grecs dans le cadre du deuxième plan de sauvetage de la Grèce pourrait être supérieure aux 21% retenus lors de la définition des grandes lignes de ce plan le 21 juillet, a estimé la Deutsche Bank. La première banque allemande a déclaré que cette décote serait de l’ordre de 25% ou plus.
Axa aurait mis en vente sa division de private-equity
Axa met en vente sa division de private-equity, qui pourrait valoir un milliard de livres sterling (1,15 milliard d’euros), croit savoir vendredi la chaîne d’information britannique Sky News. «Axa ne fait aucun commentaire sur les rumeurs de marché», a déclaré un porte-parole du groupe, précisant qu’Axa Private Equity, filiale d’Axa IM, gérait 28 milliards de dollars d’actifs. Axa Private Equity avait annoncé mercredi l’achat d’un portefeuille de fonds de capital-investissement d’une valeur de 1,7 milliard de dollars (1,2 milliard d’euros) auprès de Citigroup , réalisant ainsi pour la deuxième fois une transaction majeure sur le marché secondaire du capital-investissement. En avril 2010, Axa Private Equity avait déjà racheté pour 1,9 milliard de dollars de fonds de capital-investissement à Bank of America , signant alors la plus grande opération jamais réalisée par un acheteur unique sur ce marché.
La Bourse de Paris touche de nouveaux plus bas
ISR, green bonds, low carbon… comment l’investissement vert et durable s’impose dans les portefeuilles en 2017 ?
23/09/2011
Madoff: Judge demands further information from trustee
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Burton Lifland on Thursday dismissed portions of a USD198m lawsuit filed by court-appointed trustee Irving Picard in the Madoff case, The Wall Street Journal reports. The judge said parts of the complaint are «opaque» and lack detail about some of the transactions by some relatives of Bernard Madoff who all had been working at Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities.But he said the flaws were largely «correctable,» and gave Picard 45 days to amend his lawsuit
23/09/2011
CalPERS invests USD100m in a Canadian hedge fund
The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) has invested USD100 million in seed money with Breton Hill Capital, a Toronto-based global macro hedge fund with investments in equities, commodity and financial futures, and currencies.The investment, part of the CalPERS Absolute Return Strategies program, is CalPERS first seed investment with a hedge fund manager. The pension fund also has approximately USD500 million invested with customized funds of hedge funds focusing on emerging managers.CalPERS launched its Absolute Return Strategies program in April 2002 and had USD5.3 billion invested in it as of June 30, 2011.
23/09/2011
IMA critical of ESMA proposals for UCITS-compliant ETFs
The UK’s Investment Management Association (IMA) has published its response to ESMA’s paper on guidelines for UCITS Exchange-Traded Funds and Structured UCITS. It questioned ESMA’s rationale for singling out certain types of UCITS products while excluding others, such as non-UCITS Exchange-Traded products."UCITS are already subject to detailed regulation. Regulatory intervention should happen only where there is a clear market failure, but we see no evidence of this», comments Julie Patterson, director at the IMA. «Regulators are concerned about ‘complexity’ in retail products. But complexity does not necessarily equate to risk. Sophisticated investment strategies often mean less risk for investors in terms of the expected return», she adds.
23/09/2011
ETFs: European investors preferred their home markets in August
According to statistics from the BlackRock Investment Institute reported by AGEFI, European ETFs posted outflows of USD1.8bn in August. This increased aversion to risk largely affected trackers focused on emerging markets equities, which lost as much as USD1.5bn, and ETFs focused on North American equities, which saw outflows of USD1.1bn. Investors appear to have concentrated on their home markets, and European equity ETFs saw inflows of over USD1bn.
23/09/2011
J.P. Morgan AM recruits a head of emerging markets currencies
J.P. Morgan Asset Management has recruited Nima Tayebi for its team specialised in emerging markets debt and currencies. He will be in charge of investment strategy for emerging markets currencies, and will report to Pierre-Yves Bareau, director of the emerging markets debt unit, and Jonathan Griggs, director of currencies strategy. Tayebi had previously been a portfolio manager at Polar Capital Partners. He also spent 9 years as a manager specialised in emerging market currencies and debt at Aberdeen Asset Management. He had previously spent two years at Millennium Global Investments, a boutique specialised in currencies, and held research and trading positions in currencies (sell side) at Salomon Brothers and Renaissance Capital in Moscow. The emerging market debt teams, led by Bareau, are spread over seven cities worldwide. Their assets under management have increased from USD7bn to USD17bn in the past two years.
23/09/2011
The Boston Company Asset Management reshuffles management
The Boston Company Asset Management, a management boutique affiliate of BNY Mellon Asset Management, has announced several changes to its management team. Bart Grenier, chief executive officer, will now also serve as chief investment officer. Joe Gennaco will become chairman in addition to his position as chief operating officer. John Truschel, currently chief investment officer, will direct a newly-created team as global head of investment strategy.
23/09/2011
DWS Investments adds to Paris team
DWS Investments has hired Amédée de Guillebon for its French sales team. De Guillebon will be in charge of fund sales and distribution activities via third-party distributors, including fund of fund managers, insurers, banks and distribution platforms. He will report to Philippe Goettmann, head of DWS Investments for France and Monaco. Before joining DWS Investments, De Guillebon, 36, was head of development at BNP Paribas Investment Partners. He began his career in asset management in 2002 at Fortis Investments in Brussels, as head of marketing.
23/09/2011
Aberdeen preparing to reopen redemptions from Degi International
The open-ended real estate fund Degi International (EUR1.58bn) has sold the office property Focus Foltrowa (33,644 square metres) in Warsaw for EUR117m. The sale price is higher than the price the property was acquired for in 2007, but lower than its EUR118m book value.However, the sale will allow Aberdeen to free up liquidity for the Degi International fund, whose closure to redemptions was extended for one year, until 16 November 2011 (see Newsmanagers of 8 November 2011). Liquidity in the fund currently totals 22%.
23/09/2011
AD-VANCED Dynamic AM releases its first fund of ETFs
The new German management firm AD-VANCED Dynamic Asset Management GmbH, founded by three veterans of Veritas (see Newsmanagers of 22 September 2011), has announced that it has received its first advising mandate for a total amount in the tens of millions of euros.Management of the dynamic asset allocation will be based on an exclusive process for analysis of the market and its indices, entitled “Indexpicking.” The process, which relies on investments in ETFs, is used for the first fund of ETFs from the firm, AD-VANEMICS (LU0665450838), which has recently received a sales license in Luxembourg. The new product is available in institutional and retail share classes. The initial subscription period will run from 10 October to 10 November 2011.
23/09/2011
JP Morgan plans to develop custody operations
JP Morgan Worldwide Securities Services (WSS) is planning to develop its custody and clearance activities in Brazil and Russia, two key markets for the sub-custodian activities of JP Morgan, Hedge Week reports. For Russia, Katerina Sizova has joined JP Morgan as head of activities in Russia, and will deploy the group’s growth strategy. Sizova previously worked at Renaissance as head of operations. For the Brazilian market, JP Morgan has announced that it has integrated its custody activities.
23/09/2011
AllianzGI outsources middle office services
Allianz Global Investors has signed a global outsourcing agreement with Northern Trust to provide middle office services for RCM in Asia-Pacific, Europe and North America. Northern Trust will also supply settlement and accounting services. As a part of the contract, Northern Trust has taken on a team of 12 people from AllianzGI in Hong Kong, where since November last year, the US firm has been developing its administration services activities. The activities now employ 30 staff.
23/09/2011
US funds reduce their exposure to European banks
The major US money market funds have cut their exposure to the European banking sector to their lowest level since 2006, the Financial Times reports. The 10 largest US money market funds have reduced their short-term lendings to European banks to only USD284.6bn as of the end of August, equivalent to 42.1% of their total assets, according to Fitch Ratings.
23/09/2011
DIC Asset acquires three properties
“In two deals with international investors,” DIC Asset has acquired a commercial property in Duisburg, the Marktforum (10,000 square metres, wholly leased) for EUR16m, and two core office properties, measuring 40,000 square metres, for EUR62m, one of which is in Karlsruhe, and the other in Leipzig. The latter two properties will be added to the portfolio of the institutional real estate fund DIC Office Balance I, in which DIC Asset controls a 20% stake.DIC Asset, which has been a part of the SDax index since June 2006, currently manages real estate assets of about EUR3.2bn, in 280 properties.
23/09/2011
CalPERS seeks investment partners for multi-asset class portfolio
The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) is seeking external strategic partners to manage a multi-asset class portfolio and provide insights and analytics on asset allocation and portfolio construction decisions. CalPERS expects to retain two or three firms to manage a total of up to USD2 billion in assets. The solicitation begins September 23, 2011, and ends on October 21, 2011.
23/09/2011
Permira acquires majority of Netafim from three kibbutzim
The private equity investor Permira has acquired 61% of the Israeli irrigation firm Netafim (3,000 employees) for USD870m, of which it provided USD400m from its own capital. Counting its USD200m in debt, Netafim is valued at over USD1bn, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports.The firm was founded in 1965 by the kibbutz Hatzerim, which will retain a 30% stake after the transaction. The other vendors are the kibbutzim Magal (whose stake is reduced to 6% from 23%) and Yiftach (which controls 8%).
23/09/2011
Cowen launches a managed futures fund
The US group Cowen has launched the Ramius Trading Strategies Managed Futures Fund, which offers investors access to a portfolio of managed futures dedicated to institutional clients, and which offers transparent information about the evolution of positions, along with an improved risk analysis framework. Assets under management in the fund, launched on 13 September this year, total USD230m.