Thomas Egger, who had previously been head of UBS Wealth Management for the Iberias, has left the business to join the team at the new family office Parkview, Finews reports. He will be based in Zurich.

Barclays Bank (Switzerland) is planning to develop its wealth management activities in Switzerland. With this in mind, the British group has opened a branch office in Zurich, from which it will now handle wealth management for local and international clients. The bank has chosen to emphasize Eastern Europe (Russia and the countries of the CIS). The Barclays investment bank, which has been present in Zurich since 2001, will work in close collaboration with the wealth management team, it announced in a statement released in Geneva. Martina Bigliardi Moehr will lead the Zurich offices of Barclays Bank (Switzerland). She had previously been head of wealth management activities for Russia, central and eastern Europe and Israel at Clariden Leu, the former private bank of Credit Suisse. The branch office already has seven employees, and is planning to recruit up to 30 people in the next 12 months. Assets under management are estimated at CHF18bn (in and out Switzerland).

SIX Swiss Exchange on 4 June announced the forthcoming introduction of SMI Risk Control indices, reflecting a mortage portfolio which aims to diversify risks inherent in SMI assets. The portfolio includes an investment in SMI and an investment in the money markets at overnight rates. Asset allocation for the new indices is controlled daily to maintain the desired risk level. With the new SMI Risk Control indices, participants in the market can have access to underlying SMI assets. Dynamic allocation to high-risk investments in SMI and investment in the money markets takes into account the various risk profiles of investors.

Gianluca Oderda, who had been manager of the Pictet Absolute Return Global Diversified fund, has left Pictet, according to reports in Citywire Global. He is replaced by Carlos Ontaneda, who was appointed last year ahead of the departure of Oderda.

Union Bancaire Privée (UBP) has laid off 30 personnel. The Geneva bank had already parted with 45 employees between September and December 2011. “In the context of profound changes in the entire banking industry, particularly related to ongoing regulatory changes, we are condinuing to adapt our personnel to the activities at our bank and to keep costs under control,” Jérôme Koechlin, spokesman for UBP, has told the Geneva newspaper La Tribune.

Of 10,000 private equity funds raised in the past decade, at least 200 are so-called ‘zombie’ funds, or dead funds which tie up investors’ money and continue to charge them fees, the Wall Street Journal reports. These represent about USD100bn in an industrity with a total of USD1.5trn, according to TorreyCove Capital Partners. It is complicated for investors to get out of these funds, the newspaper observes, or doing so is costly for them. The WSJ cites the example of the Illinois pension fund, which paid USD580,000 in management fees to various asset management firms for zombie funds in 2010.The Securities and Exchange Commission is delving into such issues as part of a broad look at private-equity funds, adds the newspaper.

On 31 May, AlphaClone, with Exchange Traded Concepts (ETC), launched the AlphaClone Alternative Alpha ETF (acronym ALFA) on the NYSE. The fund invests in US equities confirmed to be held by hedge fund managers. The objective is to capture alpha from the long positions of these asset managers, while protecting the portfolio against protracted downturns on the market via a dynamic hedging mechanism.The fund is derived from the hedge fund replication methodology developed by AlphaClone and its founder, Mazin Jadallah, on the basis of the AlphaClone Hedge Fund Long/Short Index, a passive, risk-managed index. It is the first ETF born of AlphaClone’s partnership with the options exchange International Securities Exchange (ISE).Unlike replications of the beta of hedge funds, the AlphaClone index directly selects the long positions of the fund on the basis of public notifications by hedge funds, using the Clone Score AlphaClone rankings system.ETC is the investment adviser for ALFA, while Knight Clearing Services is the lead market maker.

Baring Asset Management (Barings), an asset management firm with several centuries of history, owned by the US firm Mass Mutual, keeps a low profile and does not release results, since it is not listed. The CEO of the parent company recently told Newsmanagers that the profit margis at the firm is far higher than the average for the industry (28%). This discrete profile in the media is also part of the DNA of the French affiliate, which is all the more reason to speak with its CEO.

An easing of US laws to allow advertising of private investment offers has opened the door to abosive advertising by private funds such as hedge funds, the US financial asset management association ICI argues. The association also suggests in a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that there should be a rule against publication of the performance of hedge funds, since a standard measurement tool has not been established.

The European Commission will this year not present its revision of the integrated retirement plan (IRP) directive.“Due to the complexity and size of the project, and particularly of very high quality quantitative impact studies, I have decided to take a few more months to finalise the revision. We are thus planning to present the revised directive by summer 2013, rather than at the end of 2012,” The European commissioner in chage of the internal market and services, Michel Barnier, announced on 1 June in Amsterdam.The European Commissioner also pointed out that not all the rules included in Solvency II will be applied to professional retirement institutions. “However, European regulations applicable to insurance businesses are important for pension funds, since there is a legal link between the two,” Barnier points out. The pension fund directive, which dates from 2003, currently refers to insurance regulations in force at that time, namely Solvency I.In this environment, how can pension funds be made to benefit to the same extent as insurers from more effective regulations, better adapted to the challenges of today? “I think it is important to maintain competitive equality betweeb insurance companies and pension funds, when they provide similar and interchangeable products. I would not like to penalise either one or the other,” says Barnier.Hence the decision not to rush things and to continue to work in close collaboration with the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA) and all participants to ensure “a good balance in the final text.”

The board at Deutsche Bank provided some details of its organisation at its meeting on 1 June. The bank has decided to create a new division, Asset & Wealth Management (AWM), which will include Asset Management and Wealth Management activities, and will be led by Anshu Jain, co-chairman of the board and of the Group Executive Committee. The new division will be on a par with the other major units, Corporate Banking & Securities (CB&S), Global Transaction Banking (GTB), and Private & Business Clients (PBC).

Invesco on 31 May announced that it has signed an agreement to sell most of its European CLO assets to 3i Debt Management. The contracts represent an overall total of EUR2bn. After completing the transaction, Invesco, which would like to remain a front-line actor in CLO markets, will oversee 16 CLOs, with assets under management of USD5.3bn.

European funds, including both short-term and long-term funds, in second quarter 2012 began to show net inflows, according to the most recent statistics compiled by Morningstar. In April, investors placed more than EUR14bn in money market funds, and only EUR4.3bn in long-term funds. Bond funds continue to be the most sought-after asset class, particularly private loan funds and non-European debt funds. The trend is similar for equity funds, as the Morningstar euro zone large caps category has seen a 14th consecutive month of net outflows in April, totalling EUR900m.“Despite particularly erratic markets, inflows remain positive for funds domiciled in Europe at the beginning of second quarter. However, the funds which are attracting money are mostly invested outside Europe, both in equities and bonds,” says Dan Lefkovitz, in the European research team.

State Street has announced the appointment of Timothy Donovan as head of services dedicated to real estate funds in North America. Donovan previously worked at Beacon Residential Management, where he was chief executive officer for asset management, in charge of the real estate portfolio.

Currently, assets at OFI AM total about EUR52bn. Net inflows since the beginning of the year totalled about EUR2bn, about half of which have been for money market funds, with the remainder largely going to diversified funds investing mainly in bonds, in emerging markets funds and in inflation-linked funds, Maxime du Chayla, deputy CEO, announced on Friday at a presentation. However, there have not been positive net inflows to equities.Maxime de Lavenere Lussan, analyst and fund manager, for his part, pointed to the OMS US Equity fund (EUR70m), a mandate fund with allocations to Kinetics (25%), Baron (35%) and Edgewood (40%), and to the SSP GE US Equity fund (EUR77m), whose management is outsourced to General Electric Asset Management. Both products show attractive returns.Astrid Fredericksen, analyst and fund manager, says that the OMS BRIC fund in November 2011 became a BRICA fund, with the addition of the Africa/Middle East region, which now accounts for 8.5% of assets. Alongside Charlemagne for Brazil, East Capital for Russia, F&C for India and Lloyd George for China. OFI has selected Silk Invest for Africa/Middle East.Lastly, Xinghang Li, fund manager, painted a portrait of the Chinese market, which he considers promising. With Great Wall Fund Management, OFI has a local partner which manages a USD120m fund for it, while the QFII allocation for the French asset management firm is USD150m.

The product range from ABC Arbitrage now includes six funds, with the launch on 1 June of ABCA Interference, “which exploits new ways of dealing in futures.”The firm says that “in an infavourable context for the group’s activities, the pace of activity remains positively oriented while noticeably below the pace in first half 2011.”As of 1 June, net subscriptions totalled EUR389m since the beginning of 2012, “exceeding the inflow objectives announced in 2011,” a statement says.

Juan Ignacío Romeu, executive director of UBS Wealth Management in Spain, where he spent eight years, has been recruited as a senior private banker at Pictet Wealth Management in Madrid, Funds People reports. Luis Sánchez de Lamadrid, CEO of the private bank in Spain, says that Pictet ambitions to become one of the largest actors in wealth management in the retail client segment in Spain in the next five years, with EUR5m to EUR10m in assets. The team currently dedicated to this segment includes 18 people.

The International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) on 1 June announced that it has decided to extend its consultation on the systemic risks related to money market funds, initially limited to a period of one month. The reason for the decision is a desire on the part of participants to offer more in-depth and complete comments. As a result, the consultation period will remain open until 29 June, the international organisation states.

Two Italian real estate asset management firms may soon be merging. Beni Stabiliti Gestioni Sgr, an asset management firm controlled by the Leonardo Del Vecchio group, and Ream SGR, a firm owned by the Fondazione di Torino, Asi and Alessandria, are said to be in talks over a potential merger, according to reports in Il Sole – 24 Ore. The firms together manage about EUR3bn.

Following the announcement that subscriptions and redemptions to the real estate fund of funds Allianz Flexi Immo have been frozen (see Newsmanagers of 18 April), Allianz Global Investors (AGI) has announced that the real estate fund of funds Premium Management Immobilien-Anlagen, or PMIA (DE000A0ND6C8) has been liquidated as of 31 May 2012, as scheduled in August 2011.Assets in the product (EUR592.44m as of 30 May), whose redemption had been suspended since 27 September 2010, will now be taken over by Commerzbank, the depository bank. The funds had been launched in May 2008 for customers of Commerzbank.

Agefi reports that Great Britain has filed a legal action with the European Court of Justice (ECJ) to challenge the competence of European financial regulators to prohibit short-selling against the will of the United Kingdom.

In May 2012, Spanish securities funds saw their 14th consecutive month of net redemptions, totalling EUR901m, compared with EUR673m in April, EUR427m in March, EUR4m in February and EUR401m in January, for a total of EUR2.4bn in net redemptions since the beginning of the year. As of 31 May, according to the Spanish Inverco association of asset management firms, assets totalled EUR124.718bn, EUR2.737bn less than one month previously, as net remdeptions were responsible this time for 33% of the decline, compared with 675 due to negative market performance – compared with 21% and 79%, respectively, in April. Three asset management firms were particularly severely affected by net redemptions in May: Bankia Fondos, with net redemptions of EUR224.75m, which are said to be related to the difficulties at, and nationalisation of, its parent company, BBVA Asset Management, with net redemptions of EUR188.66m, and Santander Asset Management, with net redemptions of EUR180.73m. However, Banca Civica, Mutuactivos and Bankinter Gestión de Activos last month show net inflows of EUR95.6m, EUR56.9m and EUR51.4m, respectively.

Skagen has hired Elisabeth F. Warland as portfolio manager.She will be part of the fixed income team managing the fixed income funds Skagen Tellus and Skagen Avkastning, together with Torgeir Høien and Jane S. Tvedt.She will be responsible for analysing existing and potential investments in the funds.Elisabeth Warland has experience managing fixed income funds and bonds from La Banque Postale Asset Management and Crédit Agricole Asset Management in Paris. She comes to us from Vaagen AS and she will be joining SKAGEN on a temporary contract on 1 July 2012. Separaetly, Jane S. Tvedt will be going out on leave from the summer. Torgeir Høien will be the lead manager of Skagen Avkasting during Tvedt’s leave of absence.

L’IRCANTEC a reconstruit son portefeuille en 2008 suite à la réforme des retraites. A l'époque, son allocation d’actifs était la suivante : 60% en obligations d’Etats, 25% en actions, 10% en obligations indexées à l’inflation et 5% en immobilier. Mais les lois Fillon en novembre 2011 ont obligé le régime à revoir cette répartition. L’an dernier le comité de direction a décidé de modifier une nouvelle fois son allocation en réduisant son exposition aux dettes souveraines à 46% tout en augmentant la part d’investissements en obligations indexées à l’inflation à 20% et les actions à 29%. Par contre les 5% en immobilier restent identiques. Cette nouvelle allocation sera effective avec l’attribution des mandats en cours. L’IRCANTEC devrait ensuite s’intéresser à des classes d’actifs alternatives. D’ailleurs, le régime a prévu, lors d’une récente réunion du comité de direction, son premier investissement en private equity. Il s’agira en effet d’un fonds TSI (Tourisme Social et Investissement) qui aura pour ambition de rénover des bâtiments dédiés au tourisme social. La Caisse des dépôts, l’IRCANTEC et l’agence nationale des chèques de vacances (ANCV) investiront 20 milliards d’euros dans le fonds TSI lors des 5 prochaines années. Ce fonds sera inspiré du modèle prévalant dans le private equity. Il y aura plusieurs tours de levée de fonds. Les investisseurs vendront leurs parts lorsque le projet sera complet et récupèreront alors les profits générés. Les équipes seront au comité de ce nouveau fonds pour superviser les investissements effectués. Même s’il ne s’agit pas d’un véritable véhicule de private equity, cela s’en rapproche et permet à l’IRCANTEC de se familiariser avec ce type d’investissement, avant de s’y engager pleinement dans le futur. L’un des défis de l’IRCANTEC sera de trouver des investissements alternatifs qui respectent les critères de la charte ISR.

Le ministre français de l’Economie et des Finances, Pierre Moscovici, a jugé dimanche que la recapitalisation des banques en Europe devrait s’opérer via le Mécanisme européen de stabilité (MES) plutôt que de passer par les Etats. «Dès lors que ce mécanisme serait en place, on y verrait plus clair et la situation serait aussi plus détendue pour un certain nombre de banques, y compris espagnoles», a-t-il estimé.

L’Etat français doit réaliser cinq milliards d'économies par an afin de ramener les finances publiques à l'équilibre d’ici à 2016, selon un rapport de l’Inspection générale des finances dévoilé par Les Echos. Ce rapport, commandé par l’ex-Premier ministre François Fillon, préconise notamment une baisse des effectifs de l’Etat et de ses opérateurs et le gel des salaires et des retraites.

Selon des déclarations faites par le gouverneur de la banque centrale chypriote au Financial Times, le pays pourrait demander une aide internationale alors qu’il doit recapitaliser d’ici la fin du mois, à hauteur de 1,8 milliard d’euros, la deuxième banque domestique Cyprus Popular Bank. «Il est difficile de voir d’où cette recapitalisation va venir, si ce n’est de l’Europe», a renchéri Michalis Sarris, le président de l'établissement.

La Grande-Bretagne a ouvert une procédure devant la Cour de Justice de l’Union européenne (CJUE) pour contester la compétence, donnée aux nouveaux régulateurs financiers européens, d’interdire les ventes à découvert contre la volonté britannique. Les ventes à découvert permettent de vendre un titre sans le détenir dans l’espoir de l’acheter à un prix plus bas à l’avenir afin de réaliser un bénéfice.

Les électeurs irlandais ont ratifié le Pacte budgétaire européen à une large majorité de 60% des votants lors du référendum de jeudi. L’Irlande était le seul des 25 Etats membres de l’Union européenne signataires du traité à avoir opté pour une ratification par référendum. Le pacte budgétaire vise à instaurer une plus grande discipline en matière de finances publiques.

L’activité du secteur tertiaire en Chine a ralenti en mai pour le deuxième mois d’affilée, montre l’indice PMI non-manufacturier, qui a reculé à 55,2 contre 56,1 en avril et 58,0 en mars. Cet indice officiel, calculé par la Fédération chinoise de la logistique et des achats, fournit un aperçu de l’activité dans le secteur tertiaire, qui représente moins de 45% de l'économie du pays.