Inversis Banco has announced the launch of a unit-linked savings plan with El Corte Inglés, the SECI Selección Gestoras, whose assets will be placed in ten investment funds. Management will be “active and dynamic,” with the objective of a performance 200 basis points higher than the inflation rate and an ex-ante volatility of 4% to 7%. Inversis will be the advisor and exclusive distributor.

Following the departure of Paul Boughton from Neptune, where he had been in charge of development for continental Europe, the European sales team at the UK asset management firm remains in place, a spokesperson has told Newsmanagers. Philippe Bretaudeau and Henry Foster will continue to work with European client base, particularly in France, where Neptune funds have been licensed for sale since March 2010. Patrick Berton, sales director at Neptune, has assumed overall responsibility for our European sales initiatives on an interim basis. Boughton joined Mirabaud after three and a half years at Neptune. He had previously been at Legg Mason.

Lars Walter on 1 October will rejoin the distribution team at Threadneedle Investments as sales director for southern Germany, and for a selection of key accounts. He had previously worked for the firm until 2005, before joining cominvest (Commerzbank), and subsequently Fidelity Investment Managers, where he was director in charge of relations with private banks, asset managers, and family offices. He will now report to Werner Kolitsch, head of Germany and Austria.

Société Générale Securities Services (SGSS) has appointed Jochen Meyers as head of sales for Germany and Austria. He will report to Mathieu Maurier, head of sales at SGSS. SGSS Deutschland (KAG) mbH, led by Frédéric Barroyer, country head for Germany at SGSS, has doubled the volume of its asstes under management since 2007, for a total of EUR69bn (as of 30 June 2011), with 562 funds (as of 30 June 2011) administered for various businesses, a statement says.

Stefan Mülheim, who had been head of marketing at Bridge Asset Management in London, has been appointed as Senior Managing Director at Sciens Fund of Funds Management Holdings, an affiliate of Sciens Capital Management Group.Mülheim, who will report to Stavros Siokos, president of fund of hedge funds and of the managed accounts platform, will be in charge of development for institutional clients in German-speaking countries.The position is newly created, and will aim to serve German insurers in particular, who are facing the implementation of Solvency II legislation.

With Mirabaud Australia, Mirabaud Securities, an affiliate of the Swiss firm Mirabaud, is extending its intermediation activities in Australia, with the opening of a representative office in Perth, and a new brokerage platform. The new office extends Mirabaud’s international range of services with execution and advisory, as additions to the brokerage activities already in place in London, Madrid, Geneva, Dubai and Hong Kong.The new office will be led by Stephen Dobson, ex Merrill Lynch Asia, who will aim to create a team “in the near future.”The new platform “will also create new channels on Australian markets for international institutional clients of Mirabaud,” the group says. Mirabaud Australia will work in close collaboration with the London office, which will execute client transactions.

The Financial Times reports, citing sources familiar with the matter and a letter to clients, that Goldman Sachs is closing the Global Alpha Fund, a major quantitative hedge fund, after the portfolio showed heavy losses, and investors sought to pull out. From the beginning of the year to the end of August, the fund has lost 12%. In its letter to investors, Goldman announced that it has begun to liquidate assets, a process which will be completed by mid-October. About USD1bn in assets remain in the fund.

Old Mutual Asset Managers is to launch a UK equities long/short fund, managed by Simon Murphy, Investment Week reports. The Dublin-domiciled fund, UK Opportunities Fund, will be released in fourth quarter.

Harald Espedal, CEO of Skagen, is to take on a dual role and will assume the duties of investment director. This will enable Kristian Falnes, current investment director, to focus exclusively on his responsibility as lead manager for our global equity fund Skagen Global. Kristian Falnes was appointed investment director in November 2007. Since then the portfolio management team has grown from 13 to 18 professionals, in line with an increase in AUM from NOK 70 billion to just under NOK 100 billion over the same period.

The US Department of Justice has opened an investigation to determine whether Société Générale helped to make the job easier for Texan accused fraudster R. Allen Stanford, by failing to look into suspicious transactions. Stanford is accused of orchestrating a Ponzi pyramid scheme worth USD7bn, the Wall Street Journal reports.The case concerns the bank account of one of Stanford’s companies with SG Private Banking (Suisse) SA, which is suspected of having been supplied by investor subscriptions, and of being used for payments to Stanford’s personal accounts and for paying bribes to the auditor in Antigua.As a part of the criminal investigation, authorities are seeking to determine whether Société Générale failed to apply due diligence procedures, or to ask questions about irregular banking activities, according to sources close to the case.

Total assets under management as of 31 August at Franklin Resources, Invesco and Legg Mason fell by USD66.2bn in one month, a contraction largely imputable to a decline of USD63.5bn in assets in equity products.The largest decline in assets under management recorded in August was at Franklin Resources, where assets fell by USD30.8bn, to USD716.4bn as of the end of the month, while the decline for the equities portfolio alone totalled USD26.5bn.At Legg Mason, total assets fell by USD12bn in August (and USD13.6bn for equities), to a total of USD643.4bn.For Invesco, assets fell by USD23.4bn (which corresponds exactly to the decline for the equities portfolio), to a total of USD629.4bn.

According to reports received by Newsmanagers, Christophe Valette is joining UBI, the French structure of the Swiss bank Union Bancaire Privée. Like many others who have recently joined the Swiss bank, Valette is a veteran of Fortis Investments. He was previously head of institutional investor relations at BNP Paribas Investment Partners, who then joined Fortis Investments.

BNP Paribas Securities Services on 15 September announced that it is extending its European clearing activities, to become “the first player able to provide third-party clearing services on bond markets in France, Spain, and Italy.” For settlement of bond products on these markets, operators had previously been required to become direct members of a central clearing house. By becoming members of LCH.Cearnet SA and CC&G for bond markets, BNP Paribas now offers a complete range of solutions to optimise post-execution processing and liquidity requirements. “Bond markets are returning to the good graces of investors, and a growing number of our clients are turning to clearance flows to reduce counterparty risks, as opposed to bilateral transaction settlement,” says Philippe Ruault, head for clearing, settlement and custody services at BNP Paribas Securities Services. “Meanwhile, legislation such as EMIR and Dodd Frank are bringing new instruments into play in standardised clearing infrastructures. The combination of these factors is leading to a real increase in demand,” Ruault continues. “Last year, the nominal value of repurchase operations and transactions on European government bonds cleared by LCH.Clearnet rose by about 30%, and that figure is likely to increase further between now and 2013,” Ruault concludes. The bank is also planning to become a member of other central counterparty clearing houses, in order to meet rising demand and volumes from its clients.

Following warnings in Spring 2001 from the Financial Stability Board, the Bank for International Settlements and the International Monetary Fund, providers of ETF funds are increasingly improving their transparency. “Until the end of 2010, the level of transaparency for synthetic ETFs was low,” a Morningstar research of synthetic ETFs presented on 15 September, entitled “Synthetic ETFs Under the Microscope,” observes. The composition of collateral and substitution asset baskets was only disclosed once or twice per year, and often only at the demand of investors. “Real progress has been made in this area, largely due to pressure from investors on ETF providers,” the study funds. Some synthetic ETF providers are now publishing data on the composition of asset baskets on a daily basis, and several players have recently announced that they are also planning to do the same. This is a sign of goodwill which will be bound to improve or revive investor confidence in an environment of widespread suspicion, as the regulatory authorities lag behind common practice. However, “there is still room for improvement in transparency,” the study finds, suggesting several areas, including generalisation of the daily publication of asset basket composition. “Daily updates are all the more pertinent in periods of high volatility on the markets, and in the wake of events such as the Lehman bankruptcy or the recent earthquake in Japan.” The authors of the study also estimate that daily information should not be limited to the composition of a single basket, but might also include sector allocation, country allocation, exposure to currency risks, and credit ratings for bonds. The study also calls for increased transparency about the cost of swaps, which are often not included in the total expense ratio (TER).

Schroders, which has now reached assets of USD3.6bn under management in the country (as of the end of May), with the help of Celfin Capital, with whom it has been working since 2003, has now decided to open its own office in Chile.The new Latin American location, following offices opened in the 1990s in Brazil, Argentina and Mexico, will initially have a staff of three, led by Alex Toledo, head of distribution, who joins from Pioneer Investments, and who will report to Gonzalo Binello, head of distribution Latin America ex Brazil.Now that Schroders is opening its own office, its cooperation with Celfin will cease, and the two businesses will cooperate to ensure a smooth transition for existing activities to the new structure.

The CEO of Legg Mason, Mark Fetting, has announced that the group is planning to increase its alternative management manpower, and to develop its activities in Asia, Asian Investor reports.Among the companies of the Legg Mason galaxy, whose assets under management total about USD655bn, are the fund of fund specialist Permal (USD23bn in assets under management), which brings in 16% of the group’s earnings. Fetting estimates that the group needs to develop new areas of alternative management expertise, either through the acquisition of new teams which would join Permal, or through the creation of new structures within the group, in all areas (single hedge funds, private equity funds, funds of funds, private equity funds of funds, real estate, commodities, and infrastructure).Another area of development for the group is Asia, which represents slightly under 15% of assets under management for the group. There is talk of opening a representative office in Beijing. Staff in the region, who currently number about 200 in Japan and 80 in Asia ex Japan, will also be sized up.

Hedge Week reports that Citigroup has recruited David Murphy, co-head of the prime finance operation at Deutsche Bank, to direct his own prime finance activity in the Asia-Pacific region. Murphy, who will join the firm in December, will report to Nick Roe, global head of prime finance & futures, based in London, and Rodrigo Zorilla, head of markets for Asia-Pacific.Hannah Goodwin, who is currently head of prime finance activities for Asia, will remain in that position until Murphy’s arrival, and will then report to him. She will then become head of prime brokerage for Asia Pacific, and will manage all client-facing business.

Le Fonds de pensions belge de Cargill (47 millions d’euros d’actifs) mène actuellement une revue complète de sa stratégie d’investissement qui aboutira à la fin du mois de septembre. Le consultant Towers Watson assiste le fonds de pension dans ses réflexions, par exemple l’intégration de nouvelles classes d’actifs ou stratégies de gestion. Cet exercice est la suite d’une étude ALM que le Fonds de pension avait lancé il y a plus de 12 mois. L’allocation d’actifs du Fonds de pensions de Cargill en Belgique est actuellement répartie à 50% en actions et 50% en obligations au travers de mandats de gestion diversifiée qui sont délégués à DeGroof Institutional AM et KBC AM.

L’allocation du portefeuille de la MACSF privilégie la sécurité. Allocation d’actifs de la MACSF au 31/08/2011: Obligations à taux fixe: 62.5% Obligations convertibles: 13.3% Obligations à taux variable : 11.5% Actions: 6.7% Immobilier: 2.8% Monétaire: 2.6% Gestion alternative: 0.6% Une faible exposition à la dette des pays périphériques de la zone euro L’exposition du fonds en euros de la MACSF à la dette souveraine obligataire à l’ensemble des pays périphériques de la zone euro est limitée à 6% en dettes souveraines du Portugal, de l’Irlande, de l’Italie, de la Grèce et de l’Espagne, dont moins de 2 % sur la Grèce. Allocation d’actifs sur les souverains périphériques européens (en prix de revient) au 12/09/2011: Irlande: 1.94% Grèce: 1.92% Portugal: 0.90% Italie: 0.88% Espagne: 0.61%

La chambre basse du parlement espagnol a voté jeudi l’accord conclu le 21 juillet par les pays de la zone euro concernant le deuxième plan d’aide à la Grèce et un élargissement des pouvoirs du Fonds européen de stabilité financière (EFSF). Le commissaire européen aux Affaires économiques et monétaires Olli Rehn a déclaré jeudi qu'à son avis, tous les Etats de la zone euro auraient ratifié les modifications du fonds de sauvetage FESF à la fin du mois. Olli Rehn, qui s’exprimait à Wroclaw en Pologne où doit se tenir une réunion informelle des ministres des Finances de l’Union européenne (Ecofin) vendredi et samedi, a également dit s’attendre à une «discussion sérieuse» sur les efforts de la Grèce durant ces deux journées. Quant à au ministre belge des Finances Didier Reynders, il a appelé les gouvernements de la zone euro à travailler sur l’idée d’euro-obligations dans les prochains mois.

La vaste réforme du Pacte européen de stabilité et de croissance, qui contrôlera de manière plus étroite les déficits, la dette et les déséquilibres macroéconomiques et dont les sanctions seront plus automatiques et plus lourdes, a été actée jeudi par les eurodéputés et les Etats membres de l’UE. Cette réforme doit encore être ratifiée officiellement au Parlement européen et par les 27.

John Boehner, le président républicain de la Chambre des représentants, s’en est vivement pris au plan de relance de 447 milliards de dollars de Barack Obama, en estimant qu’il est «un faible substitut aux politiques de croissance qui sont nécessaires pour éliminer les obstacles à la création d’emploi aux États-Unis». Selon lui, les «employeurs embaucheront s’ils bénéficient des avantages adéquats».

Morningstar propose une publication régulière du panier de titres, des appels de marge quotidiens et une meilleure qualité de l’information

Les roupies indienne et indonésienne ont été les plus touchées par des liquidations de positions en faveur du dollar

L'organisation recommande un élargissement des pouvoirs des autorités pour faire face aux abus de marché

L’OICV, qui regroupe une centaine de superviseurs nationaux, vient de dévoiler une série de principes à destination des autorités de marché afin qu’elles aient les moyens de prévenir et de faire face aux abus de marché. A cet effet, elles devront renforcer leurs pouvoirs.

Le ratio de couverture est ressorti à 2. Mais l'Espagne doit encore réaliser 30 % de son programme d'émission d'ici la fin de l'année

La couverture du risque de liquidité fait toujours débat, comme l'a montré la conférence Eurofi hier

Le quotidien britannique avance que la société américaine de private equity, déjà présente dans le secteur avec Hilton, a convenu d’acquérir le groupe hôtelier Mint Hotels pour un peu plus de 600 millions de livres, l’équivalent de plus de 680 millions d’euros. La transaction englobe huit établissements.

Le taux d’inflation de 4,5% qui sévit dans l’économie britannique devrait commencer à baisser en 2012, selon des propos de Charlie Bean, gouverneur adjoint de la BoE, cités par le journal. «Il y a une lumière au bout du tunnel. C’est un long tunnel. Et même l’année prochaine, si la baisse des revenus des ménages s’arrête, la croissance ne sera pas très forte» prévient-il.