Palatine Asset Management est la filiale de la Banque Palatine, l’une des galaxies de l’univers du groupe Banques Populaires Caisses d’Epargne (BPCE). Dominique Hartog, président du directoire de la structure parisienne, évoque pour Newsmanagers le retour des institutionnels sur les classes d’actifs plus risquées ainsi que les ambitions de la société de gestion à l’international. Notamment en Suisse où Palatine AM vise tout particulièrement les sociétés de gestion.

SCOR a conclu le 8 mars un protocole d’accord aux fins d’investir dans la société MRM, société foncière soumise au régime des sociétés d’investissements immobiliers cotées («SIIC») détenant un portefeuille mixte d’immeubles de commerces et de bureaux, et de prendre son contrôle en vue de recentrer son activité vers la détention d’un portefeuille cohérent d’actifs de commerces.La nouvelle stratégie souhaitée par SCOR pour MRM vise à améliorer le taux d’occupation des actifs, à ramener le ratio d’endettement à un niveau raisonnable pour éviter tout problème de liquidité à moyen terme, et à restaurer la rentabilité de la société. Afin de mener à bien ces objectifs, la réalisation du programme d’investissements sur les actifs maintenus en portefeuille sera poursuivie simultanément à un plan de cession portant plus particulièrement sur les immeubles de bureaux. L’investissement de SCOR, qui prend la forme d’une augmentation de capital souscrite en numéraire comprise entre 41 et 54 millions d’euros selon le taux de conversion des obligataires de MRM, s’accompagne d’un désendettement de la société et de la mise en place d’une structure financière pérenne négociée en amont de l’entrée de SCOR au capital de MRM. SCOR détiendra au plus 59,9% du capital de MRM à l’issue de l’augmentation de capital.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The auditing firm Ernst & Young is currently seeking twelve experts in the asset management sector, nine senior managers and three managers, for its “Performance Improvement” service from its financial services unit (FSO). A description of the position describes the job openings in the department, serving both traditional and alternative asset managers.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The French asset management firm Roche-Brune on Friday announced the arrival of Ronan Franck de Preaumont as a product specialist. He will be the privileged interlocutor for independent financial advisers, a statement says. Franck de Preaumont, 27, had his first professional experience as a negotiator at Cholet Dupont, and then in sales trading at GDF SUEZ Trading. Thibault Saint-Raymond will continue to provide relationships with institutional investors, multi-managers and family offices. Roche-Brune AM is 67% controlled by the Groupe Patrimonial It has nearly EUR100m in assets under management in Paris and Lyon.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; }A:link { } According to the annual rankings by LCH Investments, the alternative management unit of Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management, Ray Dalio (Bridgewater Pure Alpha) and George Soros (Quantum Endowment Fund) have remained the best hedge fund managers in the world, with gains of USD36.8bn since 1975, and USD31.2bn since 1973, respectively, Institutional Investors Alpha reports. John Paulson (Paulson & Co) is in third place, with USD22.8bn in net gains since 1994, followed by Seth Klarman (Baupost Group) with USD17.5bn since 1983, and David Tepper (Appaloosa Management) with USD17bn since 1993.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Recent indications are that real estate investors have a growing appetite for risk. Acording to the March edition of the “Real Estate Spotlight” by Preqin, 55% of private real estate investors are focusing on added value funds in 2013, compared with only 47% last year. A corrolary of this development is that investments in core real estate are attracting less interest. Core funds now interest only 45% of investors in the next 12 months, compared with 54% in the twelve months from January 2011. This rebound in interest in added-value strategies suggests that investors may be in the process of returning to one of the most popular strategies before the 2008 crisis. Last year, 36 added-value vehicles received a total of USD11bn, compared with 27 vehicles and a total of USD8bn in 2011. In terms of market share, added-value funds claimed 18% of capital in closed real estate funds in 2012, compared with 13% in 2011.

Year to date through end of February 2013, ETFs and ETPs have seen net inflows of USD49.1bn. Equity ETFs and ETPs gathered the largest net inflows year to date with USD45.1bn, followed by fixed income ETFs and ETPs with USD2.8bn, and leveraged inverse ETFs and ETPs with USD2.5bn, while commodity ETFs/ETPs had net outflows of USD5.3bn. “The flows into equity ETFs and ETPs show investors are rotating out of cash and fixed income into equities as investor confidence continues to improve,” says Deborah Fuhr, Managing Partner at London-based ETFGI.

The first week of March saw the Eurozone’s unemployment rate and a benchmark US equities index climb to record highs. Investors responded by pivoting towards the US, with flows into US equity and bond funds climbing to five and 17 week highs respectively while emerging markets equity and bond funds struggled, with flows into the latter the lowest in over seven months, according to EPFR Global. Overall flows into all equity funds totaled USD7.14 billion versus USD4.5 billion for bond funds while USD13.7 billion was redeemed from money market funds.US equity funds attracted USD4.9 billion with the bulk of that money flowing into large cap ETFs. Among actively managed funds only mid and small cap value funds managed to record inflows. YTD US equity funds have taken in USD33.05 billion versus an outflow of USD3.04 billion during the comparable period last year.EPFR Global-tracked emerging markets equity funds post inflows for the 26th time in the past 27 weeks during early March, helped by solid flows into Asia ex-Japan Equity Funds. Emerging Asia investors have turned their attention to Korea, with commitments to Korea Equity Funds since mid-February pushing over the $700 million mark.

Analyzing responses to its Global Hedge Fund Investor Survey from close to 550 institutional investors, representing USD1.03trn of hedge fund investments, Credit Suisse states that allocators this year plan to privilege long/short equity, emerging equity and event-driven strategies, the last one moving from the tenth place in 2012 to the tird this year. In terms of regional preferences, Emerging Markets and Asia-Pacific regions remained in the top two spots, though they traded places from last year’s survey. When respondents were asked to forecast total industry assets at the end of 2013, the average prediction was USD2.42trn. This would represent an industry growth rate of over 10% or USD220bn, comprising of positive performance and new capital inflows. The survey also uncovered a number of other key new industry trends and developments for 2013: Return expectations among institutional investors for hedge funds increased to 6.9% from returns expectations from a forecast of 5.4% last year. This appears to coincide with the ongoing reduction in correlations and the belief that this will create an environment for stock-picking strategies to outperform. Respondents ranked crowded trades/herd behavior, additional regulatory changes and underperformance risk as the three greatest sources of risks facing the hedge fund industry this year. Sovereign default risk and credit/counterparty risk, which were both in the top three last year, dropped significantly. Investors continue to show strong appetite for those new hedge funds launches deemed to be of institutional quality. However, in a new development, the survey results showed a large uptick in the number of investors who would require some level of reduced fees, including founder’s share classes. Sur le plan régional, les marchés émergents en général et l’Asie-Pacifique demeurent les deux ensembles préférés des investisseurs, mais ils ont échangé leurs places par rapport à 2012. Le Credit Suisse constate aussi un fort regain de faveur (26 %) pour l’Europe développée. En taille, les investisseurs préfèrent les hedge funds dont les encours se situent entre 500 millions et 2 milliards de dollars.Les institutionnels interrogés s’attendent en moyenne à un gonflement de 10 % des encours des hedge funds cette année, à 2.420 milliards de dollars. Ils escomptent de ces fonds une performance de 6,9 % contre 5,4 milliards attendus en 2012 pour l’an dernier.Le sondage met en exergue que les principaux risques identifiés par le panel pour les hedge funds sont le comportement grégaire, de nouvelles modifications de la réglementation et la sous-performance. Enfin, le Credit Suisse constate que les institutionnels sont très nettement plus nombreaux à vouloir obtenir une baisse des commissions.

Palatine Asset Management is an affiliate of Banque Palatine, one of the members of the Banques Populaires Caisses d’Epargne (BPCE) galaxy. Dominique Hartog chairman of the board at the Parisian firm , talks to Newsmanagers about the return of institutional investors to the riskiest sset classes and the ambitions of the asset management firm internationally. In Switzerland, Palatine AM is targeting asset management firms in particular.

L’ex-gérant allemand de hedge funds Florian Homm, recherché depuis cinq ans par la justice américaine, a été arrêté, le 8 mars, par la police italienne à Florence, selon un communiqué du FBI, rapporte Les Echos. L’homme est accusé d’avoir « orchestré une manipulation de marché destinée à améliorer artificiellement les performances de ses fonds, une fraude qui a provoqué au moins 200 millions de dollars de pertes à des investisseurs partout dans le monde ». Selon le FBI, l’homme âgé de cinquante-trois ans est le fondateur et l’ancien directeur des investissements d’Absolute Capital Management, un conseil en investissement basé dans les îles Caïmans et qui a géré neuf « hedge funds » de 2004 jusqu’en septembre 2007.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } According to Bloomberg, net inflows for private banking at BNP Paribas in 2012 doubled toEUR7.5bn, due to Chinese, Singapore, Indonesian and Malaysian clients. Vincent Lecomte and Sofia Merlo, the two co-directors of the unit, hope to double their assets and earnings in Asia in the next three to five years, but the French firm is also planning to develop in Turkey, Poland and Morocco, where it hopes to attract ultra-high net worth clients with at least EUR25m in financial savings.

Nicolas Sarkozy is being wooed by sovereign wealth funds including Qatar’s who are ready to back him to launch a private equity fund, according to the Financial Times. « Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund and other investors have offered to commit as much as EUR500m in total to a fund run by the former French président », people familiar with the matter said to the FT. However, Sarkozy has put this plan on hold in recent weeks because he is weighing a return to politics.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Since the beginning of this year, Meeschaert has been converting FCPs which have been in existence since 26 June 1989 to offer not only tactical asset allocation, but combining the French-registered funds MAM Patrimoine (more tactical) and the MAM Optima 250125 (two funds which were merged on 2 January 2013) for strategic exposure. As Philippe Troesch, chairman of the managing board at Meeschart Asset Management, announced on 8 March, it is proving commercially judicious that the two products are available, as the average portfolio for clients is limited to EUR0.4bn, and the two products on offer together provide a way to adopt a position on three asset classes: equities, bonds, and money markets.Meeschaert Asset Mangement has assets of about EUR1.2bn. The two funds respectively have about EUR40m in AUM, in the Patrimoine, and EUR50m in the MAM Optima 25-125 (the two numbers correspond to the exposure to equities) while SRI funds have assets of EUR300-350m under management.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Netherlands-based van Lanschot at the end of 2012 had assets of EUR40.9bn, 11% more than one year previously. But although the private & business banking unit EUR18.7bn compared with EUR19bn has seen net outflows of EUR1.9bn, asset management, primarily at Kempen Capital Management, posted net inflows of EUR2.3bn, for a total of EUR22.2bn, compared with EUR`7.7bn at the end of 2011.Van Lanschot states that due to EUR121.7m in amortisations on capital gains and one-time charges of EUR35.7bn, the 2012 fiscal year brought a net loss of EUR155.4m, compared with a net profit of EUR43.1m in the previous year. The cost/income ratio, taking into account one-time charges, deteriorated to 77.9%, from 76.5%.

Thorsten Michalik, global head of distribution for passively-managed products at Deutsche Bank, has announced that the number of physical replication ETFs on offer from db x-trackers will this year increase from 5 to 25, Die Welt reports. Synthetic replication ETFs remain the largest category (with 240 products).Reinhard Bellet, director of passive management at Deutsche bank, says that the grouping of tracker funds and other passively-managed products, which had previously been part of the investment bank, with active management (including DWS) will instantly increase the sales staff for passively-managed products from 6 to 500 worldwide.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Two members of the emerging markets team at Pictet Asset Management have left the firm, Investment Week reveals. They are Peter Jarvis, who was co-manager of the Pictet Russian Equities portfolio and the Pictet Emerging Markets fund, and Isabelle Alexander, who managed the Latin American portion of the global emerging markets funds. Pictet is not planning to replace the pair.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } In continental China, competition is becoming increasingly lively in the nascent asset management sector. The country will soon have more than 80 asset management firms. The most recent, Donghai Funds, received a license from the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC) on 19 February, and was then licensed by the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) to act as an asset management firm at the end of February. The Shanghai-based firm, which is planning to offer mutual fund type investment vehiles and segregated accounts as a first priority, has three major shareholders: Donghai Securities (45%), Shenzhen Peng Bo Group (30%), and Suzhou Xiangcheng Jiangnan Chemical Fiber Group (25%). Meanwhile, applications are also on the rise. At the end of February, six asset management firms are awaiting approval from the CBRC to submit license applications to the CSRC.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The Italian asset management firm Azimut Holding in 2012 earned consolidated net profits of EUR160.6m, compared with EUR80.4m in 2011. Consolidated earnings totalled EUR433.6m, compared with EUR325.7m in 2011. At the end of 2012, total assets at Azimut came to EUR19.6bn, of which EUR17.5bn were managed internally. A dividend of EUR0.55 will be distributed (EUR0.25 in 2011).

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Esemplia, the asset management firm dedicated to global emerging markets controlled by Legg Mason Global Asset Management, has recruited two people, Fund Web reports. They are Steve Triantafilidis, who becomes principal and chief investment officer, and Michael Bourke, long-only strategy manager. Triantafilidis previously worked at Vontobel Asset Management, as managing director and head of global equities, Bourke had been at FPP Asset Management as a partner and emerging markets manager.

Le gestionnaire activiste allemand Florian Homm a été arrêté ce week-end lors d’une visite au musée des Offices à Florence, apparemment sur un renseignement fourni par un agent du FBI en poste au consultat américain de Milan, rapporte Die Welt. L’Allemand, qui dirigeait la société de gestion alternative Absolute Capital Management, aurait escroqué ses clients de plusieurs centaines de millions d’euros et la SEC lui réclame 56 millions de dollars pour des infractions à la loi sur les valeurs mobilières. Il risque d’être extradé aux Etats-Unis.

La banque privée suisse Julius Baer envisage de doubler son effectif en Asie pour le porter à plus de 1.000 d’ici à 2015, a indiqué le CEO de l'établissement, Boris Collardi, dans un entretien au quotidien chinois South China Morning Post.Julius Baer va notamment recruter des experts en investissement dans la région afin de répondre à la demande de la clientèle fortunée en pleine croissance. Les clients asiatiques recherchent des rendements de 10% à 20%, beaucoup plus élevés que les taux de 3% à 5% attendus en Europe, relève Boris Collardi.

Eric Bourguignon, directeur de la gestion taux et crédit de Swiss Life Asset Managers

Mathieu Pivovard, responsable de la gestion diversifiée chez Allianz Global Investors France

Slavena Nazarova, économiste chez Crédit Agricole CIB

Vincent Guenzi, directeur de la stratégie chez Cholet-Dupont

Christophe Auvity, responsable Global Credit BNP Paribas Asset Management

Le régulateur chinois veut assouplir les contraintes imposées aux sociétés étrangères de gestion d'actifs et faciliter l'investissement en actions

Le taux de chômage américain est retombé à 7,7% de la population active en février ce qui correspond à un plus bas depuis fin 2008. Malgré cette embellie, les économistes estiment que la Réserve Fédérale devrait maintenir sa politique monétaire accommodante jusqu'à la fin de l’année.

Le taux de chômage en février a reculé à 7,7%, son plus bas niveau depuis fin 2008. Malgré tout, la Fed devrait encore soutenir l'économie