Suite à l’annonce par SIX, Swiss Exchange que des ETF du français Ossiam, filiale de Natixis Global Asset Management, étaient admis à la négociation en Suisse (lire Newsmanagers du 6 décembre), l'émetteur a fourni la liste des produits concernés, qui sont distribués sur le marché helvétique par Natixis Global Associates, la branche distribution de Natixis Global Asset Management.Ces fonds répliquent des indices de stratégie. Il s’agit d’Ossiam ETFiStoxx Europe Minimum Variance et d’Ossiam ETF US Minimum Variance qui reproduisent l'évolution d’indices (dividendes nets réinvestis) offrant une exposition actions tout en limitant le risque du portefeuille. D’autre part, les fonds Ossiam ETF Euro Stoxx 50 Equal Weight NR et Ossiam ETF Stoxx Europe 600 Equal Weight NR répliquent des indices de stratégie (dividendes net réinvestis) qui attribuent le même poids à chacun des titres de l’Euro Stoxx 50 et du Stoxx Europe 600, respectivement, afin d'éviter tout effet de concentration sur les sociétés à forte capitalisation.A fin novembre, Ossiam affichait un encours en ETF de 285 millions de dollars.

La Banque Heritage vient de lancer le fonds Chilton Global Strategies, un fonds alternatif Ucits long/short géré par Richard Chilton, ténor de l’univers des hedge funds, rapporte L’Agefi suisse. La Banque Heritage et Chilton Investment Company (près de 7 milliards de dollars sous gestion) travaillent ensemble depuis les premiers pas du gestionnaire américain, au début des années 1990, et la banque est l’un de ses premiers investisseurs. Le fonds est probablement le premier fonds UCITS long/short equity global géré aux Etats-Unis. Composé de six portefeuilles spécialisés - Flagship Strategies, European Equities, Small Caps, Global Natural Resources, Asian Equities et Hedged U. S. Equities-, le fonds couvre l’ensemble des actions au niveau global: toutes les régions (sauf le Japon) y sont représentées ainsi que tous les secteurs et toutes les capitalisations de marché. Richard Chilton gère personnellement la composante U. S. Equities et veille à la cohérence de l’allocation.

Sous ce titre provocateur, Cinco Días note que le groupe de gestion d’actifs Capital World est l’actionnaire principal de McGraw-Hill (avec 10,26 %) qui possède Standard & Poor’s (S&P) et que sa participation dans Moody’s est encore supérieure (12,6 %). De même, Vanguard détient 4,58 % de McGraw-Hill et 5,02 % de Moody’s. AllianceBernstein possède 1,67 % de S&P et 3,94 % de Moody’s. Intech, filiale de Janus Capital, est présente à 1,30 % dans S&P et 1,89 % dans Moody’s ; chez BlackRock International, State Street et Independant Franchiser, les parts dans S&P sont de 2,46 %, 3,24 % et 1,86 % respectivement, tandis que celles dans Moody’s ressortent à 2,18 %, 4,25 % et 2,51 %.A cela s’ajoute le fait que Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, Invesco et BNY Mellon font aussi partie des actionnaires de ces agences. Berkshire Hathaway, la société de portefeuille de Warren Buffett, détient 12,8 % de Moody’s.Le cas est différent pour Fitch, qui est une filiale du groupe français Fimalac.

Le Handelsblatt rapporte que Fidelity Investments a déposé auprès de la SEC une demande d’agrément pour le lancement d’ETF sur des indices d’actions et obligataires, pour des valeurs tant américaines qu'étrangères. Apparemment, le gestionnaire prévoit surtout de lancer des ETF sur des indices fondamentaux plutôt que capi-pondérés, comme ceux de Wisdom Tree, et des ETF «short». Cependant, ces projets ne se réaliseront que dans un certain temps, car le délai d’obtention des agréments se chiffre en mois, et peut dépasser un an.

BNY Mellon Asset Servicing a annoncé le 6 décembre que Touchstone Investments Advisors, filiale à 100 % de Western & Southern Financial Group, vient de lui confier les activités d’administration, de comptabilité et d’agence de transfert pour ses 42 mutual funds dont l’encours représente plus de 7 milliards de dollars pour 110.000 comptes clients. Auparavant, ces services étaient fournis par JP Morgan.

BNY Mellon annonce avoir recruté Ron Bruder au poste de managing director au sein de son équipe de wealth management dédiée aux familles très fortunées et aux family offices. L’intéressé était auparavant responsable des souscriptions sur le marché primaire du Chicago Board Options Exchange pour la banque Goldman Sachs.

Baring Asset Management (Barings) a annoncé le 6 décembre la nomination de Michael Siciliano en tant que responsable des ventes pour l’Amérique du Nord. Il est rattaché à George Harvey, responsable des ventes, du développement et des services à la clientèle.Michael Siciliano travaillait précédemment chez Merganser Capital Management à Boston où il était directeur des ventes. Barings souhaite développer auprès de sa clientèle en Amérique du Nord son offre sur les multi-classes d’actifs, des stratégies que Michael Siciliano connaît particulièrement bien, souligne Barings dans un communiqué.

L’institut des fonds souverains (SWF Institute) a indiqué le 6 décembre l’intégration dans son indice de transparence de l’IPIC (Abu Dhabi).Au troisième trimestre 2011, l’indice de transparence, le LMTI (Linaburg-Maduell Transparency Index), compte neuf fonds souverains affichant la note maximale de 10. On observe par ailleurs que le PIF (Afabie saoudite) et l’ADIA (Abu Dhabi Investment Authority) améliorent leur notation à 4. Le fonds souverain de Malaisie (Khazanah Nasional) progresse de son côté à 5. Reste que près d’une vingtaine de fonds souverains affichent une notation inférieure à la moyenne de 5 sur un total de 44 fonds inscrits dans l’indice.

Le portefeuille obligataire de Spirica (Crédit Agricole Assurances) représente 70% de l’actif général à fin septembre 2011, tandis que la part de l’immobilier s'établit à 16%. Les actifs de diversification ont été renforcés au cours des trois premiers trimestres 2011. Cette poche représente 11% du portefeuille à fin septembre (contre 4% fin décembre 2010). La trésorerie, investie dès que possible tout au long de l’année afin d’optimiser le rendement de l’actif, représentait 3% de l’actif en instantané au 30 septembre 2011. Nous avons renforcé nos investissements dans des obligations d’entreprises industrielles françaises (secteurs : industries - biens et services industriels, bâtiment et matériaux de construction, médias). La part des obligations émises par des entreprises représente 59% du portefeuille obligataire au 30 septembre 2011. Au cours du troisième trimestre, nous avons privilégié les maturités courtes pour bénéficier d’une plus grande flexibilité de gestion. Parmi les actifs de diversification, les OPCVM de multigestion alternative ont bien résisté au cours du troisième trimestre. Spirica s’appuie sur le savoir faire et l’expertise d’Amundi et Amundi Alyernative Investments, pour la gestion financière de ses actifs obligataires et actifs OPCVM diversifiés, et à sélectionné des acteurs majeurs de la gestion immobilière en France pour la gestion des titres immobiliers tels que: La Française AM, Amundi Immobilier, Natixis AMI, BNP REIM.

La Mutuelle Générale gère 1.9 milliards d’euros à fin octobre 2011 dont 70% d’obligations à travers des mandats. Dans un article paru dans Option Finance, Denis Metzger, directeur financier de la Mutuelle Générale revient sur les grandes caractéristique de sa gestion financière: Nous nous focalisons sur les obligations de la zone euro. En revanche, nous possédons uniquement un tiers de titres d’Etats notés triple A, et deux tiers de crédit corporate. Notre allocation d’actifs est également marquée par une part significative, de l’ordre de 6% en immobilier. Nous possédons, à travers une SCI, nos immeubles d’exploitation, ainsi que des immeubles issus de nos anciens centres de vacances. Mais, depuis plusieurs années, nos investissements en immobilier se font uniquement à travers des OPCI. Nous sélectionnons ceux qui investissent en particulier dans des immeubles de bureaux, des locaux commerciaux et des établissements de santé. outre notre poche actions, qui représente 7% de nos encours et qui est gérée à travers des OPCVM, nous détenons aussi en direct des participations dans plusieurs sociétés. Sur le non coté, nous investissons essentiellement à travers des fonds de capital développement sur des entreprises françaises. Nous avons investi par exemple dans des FCPR d’Edmond de Rothschild Investment Partners ou encore Xange Private Equity. Nous travaillons en priorité avec des boutiques et des maisons à taille humaine car nous trouvons que l’accès direct aux gérants y est plus facile. Pour notre gestion à travers des OPCVM, nous travaillons avec Exane, BFT, CPR AM, Rothschild&Cie, Oddo, Métropole Gestion, Efigest, ... Sur nos mandats, nous avons sélectionné cinq principaux acteurs: Rothschild&Cie, Covéa Finance (dans le cadre de notre accord avec la GMF), OFI AM, Tocqueville Finance et, historiquement, La Banque Postale AM.

Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), which manages the pension fund for the Norwegian government (USD550bn), would like to grant its shareholders the right to name candidates to the boards of directors at six US firms: Wells Fargo, Charles Schwab, Western Union, Staples, Pioneer Natural Resources, and CME Group. NBIM submitted proposals to this end on 22 November. At the time the proposals were submitted, the fund held stakes totalling between 0.6% and 1.1% in these firms, valued at a total of about USD1.4bn.

From 5 December, ETFs will be subject to more flexible regulations in China, Asian Investor reports. The new rules published by the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges stipulate that it is not possible to adopt short positions on ETFs. The number of shares eligible for margin call operations and securities lending have been tripled, from 90 to 285. The new list includes the seven largest ETFs in the country (SSE50, SSE180, SSE Dividends and SSE Corporate Governance on the Shanghai stock excchange, and SZSE100, SZSE mid- and small-cap and SZSE Composite in Shenzhen).

There is a mismatch between long term actual and expected returns for private equity strategies, reveals bfinance in a global survey of institutional investors issued yesterday. Responses from institutional investors highlight a significant difference between expected returns from private equity strategies and the reality of realised net of fees returns in their portfolio. 93% of institutions set their private equity funds a performance target (net internal rate of return - IRR) of over 10% yet less than half generated an actual net IRR of more than 10%.However expectations and experience varies greatly by investment strategy. In terms of individual strategies, institutions considered expected returns from private debt investments as the most closely aligned with actual returns.74% expected a net IRR of over 10% and nearly 70% achieved this. In contrast investors’ sentiment on venture capital shows the largest difference between expectations and past experience with 87% of all investors expecting over 10% net IRR and only 44% of such investors having achieved 10% or above net IRR from prior venture capital investments.Also according to bfinance, 88% of investors identified «portfolio return enhancement» as the first or second most important reason to invest in private equity. A similarly important rationale for investing in private equity is the ability to obtain returns from sources not accessible through public markets: 81% of all investors say this as the first or second reason for investing. In contrast, only 24% of investors saw «risk diversification» as being amongst the first two reasons for allocating to private equity.

The sovereign fund institute SWF Institute on 6 December announced that it has added IPIC (Abu Dhabi) to its transparency index. As of third quarter 2011, the transparency index, the LMTI (Linaburg-Maduell Transparency Index), includes nine sovereign funds with a maximal rating of 10. The PIF fund (Saudi Arabia) and ADIA (ABU Dhabi Investment Authority) have improved their ratings to 4. The Malaysian sovereign fund (Khazanah Nasional), for its part, has improved to 5. Nearly 20 sovereign funds have a rating lower than the average of 5 for a total of 44 funds included in the index.

Are we heading towards the disappearance of the shareholder? The question may be an exaggeration, but the fifteenth annual report from Proxinvest about general shareholders’ meetings raises it anyway. In France, there has been a decrease in the participation of shareholders, by number (16,309, down from 17,411, for the CAC 40), with a percentage of resolutions challenged which has fallen, but remains among the highest in Europe. For the CAC 40, thia rate comes out at 5.9%, compared with 6.3% in 2010. In the companies of the SBF 250 index, the rate is 4.79%, compared with 5% in 2010, 4.6% in 2009, and 4.1% in 2008. The number of resolutions not passed, against recommendations, which peaked at a record 64 in 2010, was only 44 in 2011, lower than the level in 2007. Shareholders have been critical of clauses to protect management in the case of a takeover (average contestation rate of 35.3%), with two such highly visible resolutions voted down at Essilor International and Publicis Groupe. Shareholders have also opposed the abrogation of their preferential subscription rights in 21 cases, including at Air France-KLM,GFI Informatique, Publicis Groupe, Rubia, Saft Groupe, and SOI TEC. They are now able to individually reject certain directors, with 7 of them rejected in 2011, including at Altran Technologies and Gascogne; they exercise serious control over the stock and option plans, with 7 such plans rejected (including Saft Groupe, Seb, Rubis and Ubisoft Entertainment), and over regulatory conventions when they include elements that concern management pay scales (Alten, César, Delachaux, Groupe Gorgé, Risk Group, Theolia). The number of external proposals or resolutions, which were seen at GDF Suez, Safran and Total, has fallen from 62 to 24 in 2010, and has fallen further in 2011, to only 12 initiatives, a level near the level in 2005 of 11. The first resolution on an environmental subject ever to be presented in France, which dealt with the operation of oil shale mines in Alberta, was not passed by the board at Total. Proxinvest deplores that it is necessary to go before the courts, as has occurred in recent years at Total, Lagardère and Société Générale, in order to present a resolution not approved by the board.

In order to settle class action legal proceedings in which Merrill Lynch had been named, filed among others by public pension funds (including the Mississippi state fund), Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BofAML) has agreed to pay USD315m to reimburse invetors who lost money on mortgage-backed securities, the Wall Street Journal reports. BofA had already set aside funds for the payment.Wells Fargo, for its part, had already agreed to pay USD125m to pension funds in a similar case.The WSJ points out that there is a number of similar class-action lawsuits underway against US banks. BofA is the most exposed, due to its acquisition of Countrywide Financial in 2008, and Merrill Lynch in 2009.

Cinco Días notes that the asset management group Capital World is the largest shareholder in McGraw-Hill (with a stake of 10.26%), which owns Standard & Poor’s (S&P), and that its stake in Moody’s is even higher (12.6%). Vanguard holds 4.58% of MacGraw-Hill, and 5.02% of Moody’s. Alliance Bernstein controls 1.67% of S&P and 3.94% of Moody’s. Intech, an affiliate of Janus Capital, has a 1.30% stake in S&P and 1.89% in Moody’s; the stakes of BlackRock International, State Street and Independant Franchiser are 2.46 %, 3.24 % and 1.86%, respectively, while their stakes in Moody’s come to 2.18%, 4.25% and 2.51%.In addition to that, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan, Invesco and BNY Mellon are also shareholders in the agencies, and Berkshire Hathaway, the portfolio firm for Warren Buffett, holds 12.8% of Moody’s.The situation is different for Fitch, which is an affiliate of the French Fimalac group.

BNY Mellon has announced that it has recruited Ron Bruder as managing director for its wealth management team dedicated to ultra-high net worth families and family offices. Bruder had previously been head of subscriptions to the primary market of the Chicago Board Options Exchange at the bank Goldman Sachs.

Baring Asset Management (Barings) on 6 December announced the appointment of Michael Siciliano as head of sales for North America. He will report to George Harvey, head of sales, development and client services. Michael Siciliano previously worked at Merganser Capital Management in Boston, where he was director of sales. Barings plans to increase its offerings of multi-asset class products to North American clients, strategies which Siciliano knows particularly well, Barings says in a statement.

Handelsblatt reports that Fidelity Investments has submitted a license application to the SEC to create ETFs based on equity and bond indices of both US and foreign securities. The asset management firm is apparently planning to launch ETFs based primarily on fundamental rather than cap-weighted indices, including indices from Wisdom Tree, as well as short ETFs. These plans will only be achieved after some time, as the time required to obtain licenses is a matter of months, and may be over a year.

BNY Mellon Asset Servicing on 6 December announced that Touchstone Investment Advisors, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Western & Southern Financial Group, has retained it for administration, accounting and transfer agency services for its 42 mutual funds, with assets of over USD7bn in 110,000 client accounts. These services had previously been provided by JP Morgan.

The Wealth-X company, a specialist in research into the ultra-high net worth (UHNW) client segment, on 6 December announced the appointment of Steve Farrer as vice-president and head of development for activities in China. Farrer will be based in the Hong Kong offices of the firm, and will lead a strategic expansion of the company in China. Wealth-X already has an office in China, in Guangzhou. Farrer previously worked for the World-Check and Mastercard International companies, as a consultant specialised in financial services, and particularly regulatory risks and deontology. According to the most recent research by Wealth-X, China has 11,475 private individuals whose wealth totals at least USD30m, while in Hong Kong there are 3,200 such people.

UBS Wealth Management has recruited Valerie Chou for the newly-created position of head of clients for the global family office (GFO) unit, Asian Investor reports. Chou will be based in Hong Kong; she previously worked at Morgan Stanley, and will report to Amy Lo, head for high net worth clients in the Asia-Pacific region. The appointment is a sign of the importance UBS attaches to the Asia-Pacific region for this family office activity. The group has refused to give figures about assets, but says merely that staff are increasing in the region. UBS Wealth Management has also recruited Linda Kwo, previously of BNP Paribas, as country head for Hong Kong.

Van Eck Global has recently launched Market Vectors Index Solutions (MVIS), a German-registered firm which will develop, sell and license the Market Vectors range of indices. The indices are currently used as the basis for many ETF funds from the US firm. Lars Hamich has been appointed CEO of MVIS.

If one or more euro zone governments should lose their AAA rating, the ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) also intends to lower its rating for the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), if heads of government do not reach agreement at their summit on Thursday and Friday on a solution to the crisis, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports.Currently, the EFSF has a AAA rating. A spokesperson for the facility has announced that a downgrade would not mean that the facility can no longer issue debt, but would mean that financing costs would increase significantly.

Following the announcement by SIX, the Swiss stock exchange, that ETF funds from the French firm Ossiam, an affiliate of Natixis Global Asset Management, had been admitted to trading in Switzerland (see Newsmanagers of 6 December), the issuer has provided a list of the products concerned, which will be available on the Swiss market from Natixis Global Associates, the distribution arm of Natixis Global Asset Management.The funds replicate strategy indices. They are the Ossiam ETFiStoxx Europe Minimum Variance and Ossiam ETF US Minimum Variancem which replicate the evolution of indices (net dividends reinvested) that provide exposure to equities while limiting portfolio risks. The Ossiam ETF Euro Stoxx 50 Equal Weight NR and Ossiam ETF Stoxx Europe 600 Equal Weight NR replicate strategy indices (net dividends reinvested), which give the same weight to all shares in the Euro Stoxx 50 and Stoxx Europe 600 funds, respectively, in order to avoid concentration on companies with large cap sizes.As of the end of November, Ossiam had ETF assets of USD285m.

Mirabaud Asset Management has decided to extend its Parisian product range (euro zone equities, France equities, funds of hedge funds, profiled asset allocation funds) to include convertible bonds, with the Luxembourg-registered fund Mirabaud – Convertible Bonds Europe, managed by Renaud Martin, who has recently been recruited (see Newsmanagers of 21 October).The new product invests in European convertible bonds which have a relatively short maturities, and aims to outperform the Exane Convertible Europe (ECI) fund. “This fund is designed on the principle of absolute returns. The portfolio (EUR35m in seed capital) has a short duration (2.5 years), returns of 5%, and a 25% sensitivity to equity markets. We are aiming for about EUR300m for the fund eventually,” Martin tells Newsmanagers.The manager adds that in light of a focus on convertible bonds issued by mid-sized businesses, the added value of the new fund “resides largely in credit analysis. We have good cash visibility for two years on securities that offer high returns.” In addition, “mid-sized companies offer more potential in terms of returns, and in terms of corporate events, since ratchet and poison put clauses created to protect the investor in case of a takeover favour convertibles,” the manager says.CharacteristicsName: Mirabaud – Convertible Bonds EuropeISIN codes:I shares: LU0689233525A shares: LU0689230778Minimal initial subscription: I shares: EUR0.5mPerformance commission: 20% of outperformance, with high watermark

AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM) on 6 December announced the release of the AXA World Funds Framlington Natural Resources fund. AXA WF Natural Resources was launched on 31 August 2011 as a Luxembourg-registered SICAV which meets the requirements of the UCITS III directive. The fund is currently on sale in Luxembourg, France, and other European countries (Germany, Austria, Belgium, and the Netherlands). The fund seeks growth opportunities on international equity markets among businesses in the commodity sector. It invests in businesses whose activities are related to industrial and precious metals, energy and soft commodities throughout the value chain (oil exploration to refinery, from agricultural machinery to fertilizer), and in all cap sizes (from USD1bn to USD350bn). The fund, aimed at investors of all types, holds an average of about 70 to 90 positions, and combines macro and bottom-up approaches in order to limit the correlation between various positions. It joins the AXA WF Framlington Hybrid Resources and AXA WF Framlington Junior Energy, which have a total of nearly EUR276bn in assets as of the end of October 2011. Main characteristics of the fund Share A I Type of investor All types of investors Institutional investors only Code Isin (USD) LU0645147686 (USD) LU0645148577 (EUR) LU0645147769 (EUR) LU06451 48650 Minimal initial subscription 0 EUR5,000,000 Minimal subsequent subscriptions 0 EUR1,000,000 Maximal management fees. 1.5% 0.6% Real management fees 1.5% 0.6% Maximum front-end fees. 5.5% 0 Maximum withdrawal fees. 0 0 Legal format Sub-fund of a Luxembourg-registered SICAV

In a joint statement cited by Handelsblatt, MSCI, S&P Indices and FTSE have announced that they may create a professional association of index providers, but add that discussions are at a very early stage.The organisation would in principle be open to all index providers, and would thus probably be a global association, as most actors operate internationally.

The Swiss firm Stoxx Limited has announced that from 19 December, shares in Imperial Tobacco Group will be included in the Stoxx Europe 50 index, while Axa will be removed from the index. For the Stoxx Asia-Pacific 50 and Stoxx Global 150 indices, Nissan Motor Co will replace Nippon Steel Corp.