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12/04/2012

BlackRock prepares to short-circuit Wall Street

BlackRock Solutions, a unit of BlackRock, will operating a trading platform on which 46 clients, including sovereign wealth funds and insurers, may make trades between them on corporate bonds, mortgages, and other types of assets. This would mean a loss of significant revenue for Wall Street investment banks, the Wall Street Journal reports. The platform would be authorised to process orders from the various actors present on it, and would charge a considerably lower fee than the stock market.
12/04/2012

Deka to discontinue investment in livestock and grains

Handelsblatt reports that DekaBank, the central asset management firm for the German savings banks, on Wednesday confirmed a decision previously announced by the NGO Foodwatch, no longer to contribute via its funds to speculation on the rising price of basic food products. The Deka-Commodities fund will be reorganised so as no longer to replicate the evolution of wheat, corn, soy or cattle. No further funds of this type will be launched.
12/04/2012

Hedge funds miss high watermarks

According to Absolute Return + Alpha, only 38% of hedge funds last year succeeded in generating performance exceeding their high watermark, compared with 73% in 2010. This has resulted in a significant reduction in the number of funds which were able to earn performance commissions.
12/04/2012

Idinvest Partners launches an FCPI fund dedicated to innovative European SMEs

The third-party management specialist serving the European private equity sector Idinvest Partners on 11 April announced the launch of a new FCPI product, Idinvest Patrimoine 2, which will invest primarily in innovative European SMEs. The fund’s investment strategy aims for a large diversification of investments in terms of sectors and stages of development of businesses. The objective is to select businesses which are active in high-added value innovative technology sectors, such as IT, telecommunications, electronics, health, and the environment.
12/04/2012

Caceis is the new depository for the Experides Sicav

The board of directors of the Luxembourg-registered Sicav Experides has selected Caceis to provide depository banking, transfer agency and financial report production services, Caceis announced in a statement on 11 April. Experides is the collective asset vehicle for the Belgian pension funds of the GDF Suez group, and the companies of the gas & electricity sector in Belgium. The EUR2bn in assets managed by the Sicav have been transferred to Caceis. The Experides Sicav is managed by Contassur Assistance Conseil, an affiliate of Contassur, a life insurance company dedicated to group insurance for the GDF Suez group and companies of the gas & electricity sector in Belgium. The new partnership strengthens the relationship between Contassur and Caceis, which already is depository for the assets of the insurance company in mandate form.
12/04/2012

Greek fraud victims threaten to sue Julius Baer

The victims of a Greek fraudster are hoping to sue Julius Baer for damages and interest, Handelszeitung reports. The fraud was committed by a representative of the Zurich-based private bank. The fraudster promised to deposit his clients’ assets safely in Zurich. In fact, he pocketed about EUR15m, In Greece, the man has already been sentenced to seven years in prison. Julius Baer contests the fact that the fraudster represented the bank, but there was a relationship, the newspaper reports. The former Baer affiliate, Swiss & Global, had a business relationship with the fraudster from 2008 until it was discontinued in 2010. The victims claim this is adequate cause to seek reimbursement from the Zurich-based bank.
12/04/2012

Increase in ETF activity in March on NYSE Euronext

Daily on-book trading volumes for ETFs on the European markets of NYSE-Euronext increased to EUR253.3m in March, compared with EUR237.3m in February, but remain 50.3% below their levels in March 2011.Block trades of ETF shares totalled EUR840.9m, compared with EUR992.6m in February, representing 13.1% of total trades on the regulated ETF market of NYSE Euronext in Europe, compared with 16.6% rhe previous month.The number of ETFs listed as of the end f March totalled 695, compared with 693 one months previously, of which 597 were primary listings, compared with 595, with the two new entrants being the Lyxor LVIX and the Ossiam EM Minvar E.Lastly, NYSE Euronext states that the median spread last month was 29.58 basis points, compared with 32.25 in February.
12/04/2012

Best first quarter since 2006 for hedge funds

According to Hedge Fund Research (HFR), hedge funds have posted a marginal loss of 0.01% in March, but with gains in January and February taken into account, performance in first quarter totalled 4.94% for the HFRI Fund Weighted Composite index, which is the largest gain for a first quarter since 2006.
12/04/2012

Deka to discontinue investment in livestock and grains

Handelsblatt reports that DekaBank, the central asset management firm for the German savings banks, on Wednesday confirmed a decision previously announced by the NGO Foodwatch, no longer to contribute via its funds to speculation on the rising price of basic food products. The Deka-Commodities fund will be reorganised so as no longer to replicate the evolution of wheat, corn, soy or cattle. No further funds of this type will be launched.
12/04/2012

Fund managers miss their best chances

A survey by Feri EuroRatings of 60 fund managers finds that over 80% of respondents credit the popularity of multi-asset class funds and emerging markets funds, but less than one third of them are planning to offer such a fund. About one in five already has such product on offer, and slightly over 10% are planning to offer one this year or in 2013.The ratings agency also states that over three quarters of asset management firms surveyed say there is good or very good potential for sales of German equity funds, although the prospects have deteriorated compared with the survey undertaken in spring 2011. Meanwhile, 90% of managers estimate that emerging market bond funds have good to very good chances of sales this year, which only 64% of respondents predicted for bond funds overall, possibly due to the popularity of high yield bonds. Feri reports, meanwhile, that optimists about European investment grade bond funds have risen to 68%, from 46% one year ago.
12/04/2012

Macquarie IM recruits in Europe

The Australian Macquarie Investment Management (MIM) group has recently announced four recruitments, in a sign of its desire to strengthen its presence in Europe, InvestmentEurope reports. Jerry Devlin, from Castlestone Management, has been appointed as head of British financial institutions, while Richard Guerin, formerly of BlackRock Investment Management, is appointed as head of consultant relations for Europe. Xavier Michel, who had previously worked at Hart Group, will be responsible for Macquarie Fund Solutions, from Vienna, Austria. With these recruitments, the team at MIM in Europe now has 14 members, in London, Munich, Frankfurt, Zurich and Vienna.
12/04/2012

Skandia IG awards a mandate to Aubrey

On 11 April, Skandia Investment Group (SIG) announced that it has awarded a GBP20m mandate to Andrew Dalrymple at Aubrey Capital Management, from the Skandia Global Dynamic Equity Fund (GBP1bn in assets). The manager will be responsible for investing in companies that are likely to profit from an increase in household consumer spending in Asia, from the thematic allocation of the fund, which is distributed to five funds, the other four being the JPM Global Financials Fund, DWS Invest Global Agribusiness Fund, Dimensional Emerging and Markets Targeted Value Fund.
12/04/2012

Ofivalmo Partenaires acquires 20% of Egamo

Ofivalmo Partenaires, a shareholder in Ofi AM and Ofi Mandats which is controlled by the Mutuelles du GEMA and the Mutuelles et Unions de la Mutualité Française, has acquired a 20% stake in Egamo, the asset management firm from MGEN. Meanwhile, MGEN has acquired 10% of Ofivalmo Partenaires. The capital agreement is accompanied by a partnership between Egamo (EUR2.5bn as of 30 March 2012) and Ofi Mandats (EUR11bn), both of which are dedicated to mandated institutional management. The agreement will include mutualisation of IT costs and expertise specifically related to the development of services related to a growing number of regulatory restraints, due to legislation such as Solvency II (financial reporting, accounting and regulatory, risk monitoring, active asset and liability simulation tools). However, the financial management of the two structures will remain distinct, says Nicolas Demont, CEO of Egamo. When asked about a more complete merger of Egamo and Ofi Mandats, Demont says that he is not aware of any plans of this type, and that it would not necessarily be the best solution.
12/04/2012

JOHIM recruits a portfolio manager for international equities

The portfolio manager Peter Rutter has joined the global equities team at J O Hambro Investment Management (JOHIM). He will now work with two of his former colleagues from Deutsche Asset Management, Charles Martyn-Hemphill and Will Kenney. Rutter will be in charge of the JOHIM Global and Waverton Global Equities funds. He had previously served as manager at IronBridge Capital Management, Investment Week states.
12/04/2012

Institutionals seek recurrent returns

In an environment of falling interest rates, which has led to a revaluation of liabilities and a downgrade of coverage ratios, the question of where to find returns is arising particularly acutely for institutional investors. According to a survey of 30 long-term investors undertaken in January and February by Image & Finance on behalf of Aberdeen, most long-term investors estimate that the decline in returns on their assets is structural and sustainable. These predictions of falling returns on assets is partly due to the euro zone bias of French institutionals and their pessimism about the economic situation within the euro zone. A slight majority are even predicting a “Japanisation” of the euro zone, which will involve excessive debt coupled with very limited growth. In this environment, institutionals are going back to basics, looking for “discount” products, recurrent returns (credit-backed securities, high yield, real estate), where the primary virtue is coverage for liabilities. For a minority of actors with room to manoeuvre in terms of risk budgets, geographical diversification is a preferred option, in both debt and equities. The study also finds that in a context of falling returns on assets, most long-term invetors have not revised the actualisation rates on their investments. However, actualisation rates in France are generally subject to accounting or regulatory standards which leave investors little room to choose an actualisation rate. Due to the relatively short-term engagements of French institutionals compared with those of pension funds from other countries, falling interest rates have a more limited impact on overall engagements, which reduces the urgency of the question of actualisation rates.
12/04/2012

CalPERS creates a position for a CFO

The California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) is looking for an experienced chief financial officer (CFO) who will oversee the financial and risk management operations of the $235 billion pension fund.“We established this position at CalPERS to ensure we maintain a high level of transparency and internal controls in our financial operations,” said the pension fund’s Chief Executive Officer, Anne Stausboll in a statement. “Our CFO will be the single point of coordination for financial and risk-related activities across our organization.”
12/04/2012

Institutionals regain interest in housing markets

A few institutional invetors are planning to diversify their assets by buying up housing properties, Les Echos reports. The trend is still timid: returns on this asset class are continuing to fall.
12/04/2012

Fidelity fighting to stay in the race

Several signs are indicating that Fidelity Worldwide Investment needs to pedal harder than most other actors in the sector in order to retain its even keel, a Financial Times article on the firm claims. The newspaper cites a downgrade in the firm’s credit rating by Standard & Poor’s, the departure of several members of management, a decline in assets and negative performance of funds, among other factors. In 2006, Fidelity Worldwide had USD300bn in assets under management, and consultants praised the stability of the group, the FT reports. The same year, management was aiming for USD500bn in assets in five years’ time, and USD1trn in 10 years. In 2008, assets fell to USD150bn.
12/04/2012

Warrenn Buffett wins out on Goldman Sachs' losing trade

The Wall Street Journal reports that Berkshire Hathaway, the portfolio management firm for Warren Buffett, made a very good deal in November when it bought USD85m in a Lee Enterprises credit from Goldman Sachs, at a price of 65%. The paper is now trading at 82%. Goldman Sachs, which was then seeking to liquidate its credit portfolio, bought the debt at 80%.
12/04/2012

Warburg launches a European smidcaps fund

Two months after releasing the Warburg-D- Fonds Small&Midcaps Deutschland, Warburg Invest on 30 March launched the Warburg – D Fonds Small&Midcaps Europa, a product managed by Christoph Gebert. The portfolio will include 30 to 50 positions, on undervalued European small and midcaps.CharacteristicsName: Warburg – D- Fonds Small&Midcaps Europa RISIN code: DE000A0LGSA4Front-end fee: 5%Management commission: 1.40%
12/04/2012

Complete Schroders product range will have KIIDs in May

Achim Küssner, CEO of Schroder Investment Management GmbH, on 11 April announced that from 14 May, every one of the 99 Schroders funds on sale in Germany and 93 funds on sale in Austria will have KIID documents. This means that the British asset management firm will make a total of 1,150 KIID documents available, corresponding to all share classes. From 7 May, most of that information will be available online at www.schroders.lu/kiid.
12/04/2012

Bond funds set sales records in February

Bond funds across Europe recorded in February their greatest sales (EUR19.5bn) since July 2005 — most notably high yield bonds reaching EUR6.5bn and beating last month’s all-time high, according to Lipper.Equity fund sales were EUR6.3bn. While global equity fund sales looked most impressive (EUR3.3bn) more than EUR1bn of this related to three new launches.In total, net sales of long-term funds (excluding money market funds) across Europe were the best for sixteen months in February, reaching EUR28.7bn.UBS was the surprise leader when comparing fund companies’ sales success, with inflows of EUR2.8bn, narrowly ahead of Allianz/PIMCO (EUR2.7bn).Funds at the top of the best-sellers list were AXA US Short Duration High Yield (EUR690m), AllianceBernstein American Income Portfolio (EUR640m) and Neuberger Berman High Yield Bond (EUR530m).
12/04/2012

Lyxor AM and Caxton Hawks launch a UCITS hedge fund

Lyxor Asset Management has announced its partnership with Hawk Quantitative Strategies LLC, a company associated with Caxton Associate LP to launch the third alternative single manager on its Lyxor Dimension UCITS Platform. The Lyxor/Caxton Hawk strategy Index Fund offers access to a medium-term, trend-following strategy with a focus on Emerging Markets. The investment strategy is based on a proprietary system developed by Jeff Enslin, a partner and portfolio manager at Caxton Associates LP, who has been trading macro/EM on a discretionary basis since 1995. As of February 1, 2012, this strategy represents approximately USD327m and Hawk Quantitative Strategies LLC manages approximately USD379m.Lyxor Dimension consists of 11 multi-manager funds, two hedge fund replicators, one absolute return program and 3 single alternative strategies.Caxton Hawk is the third single alternative strategy on the platform -after Old Mutual Asset Managers (UK) and Ikos Asset Management- and Lyxor intends to launch more alternative UCITS funds in the coming months.
12/04/2012

Derivatives: London will benefit from new regulations

The City is attracting a large part of the investments brought about by toughening regulations for derivative products accused of having aggravated the crisis, Les Echos reports. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange has announced that it is considering launching a derivatives market in London. The market would probably be an alternative to acquiring the London Metal Exchange (LME), a commodities market on which many derivative products are traded, which is also being wooed by NYSE Euronext, Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) and the Hong Kong stock exchange.
12/04/2012
Gestion d'actifs

Le Fonds de compensation AVS / AI / APG recherche un gérant d'actions suisses small et mid cap

Le Fonds de compensation AVS (assurance-vieillesse et survivants) / AI (assurance-invalidité) / APG (régime des allocations pour perte de gain) recherche un gérant actions suisses small et mid cap pour un mandat de 60 millions de francs suisses. Type de gestion: active Objectif de performance :** 300 points de base en moyenne, nets de frais par an sur une période de 4 ans Tracking error :** au maximum 15 % Benchmark: SPI Small and Middle Companies (SPISMC) Pour en savoir plus et répondre à l’appel d’offres, cliquez ici.
Gestion d'actifs
12/04/2012

La MGEN et Ofivalmo s'associent

La MGEN et Ofivalmo, actionnaires majoritaires respectivement d’Egamo et d’OFI Mandats, annoncent avoir conclu un accord. Celui-ci prendra la forme d’une participation croisée avec d’une part, l’entrée de la mutuelle étudiante à hauteur de 10 % au capital d’Ofivalmo Partenaires (actionnaire d’OFI AM et d’OFI Mandats), et d’autre part, une prise de participation par Ofivalmo Partenaires de 20 % du capital d’Egamo.
12/04/2012

Le Sénat lance une consultation sur les agences de notation

La mission commune d’information du Sénat sur le fonctionnement, la méthodologie et la crédibilité des agences de notation, présidée par Frédérique Espagnac, lance une consultation en ligne en direction des investisseurs, des émetteurs et des analystes des agences à l’adresse http://blogs.senat.fr/agences_de_notation/. Le rapport «Espagnac-Montesquiou» devrait être publié à l’été 2012.
12/04/2012

La Chine envisage de poursuivre la libéralisation du yuan

Les autorités chinoises envisageraient d’octroyer la possibilité aux sociétés du pays d’emprunter des fonds libellés en yuan en dehors de ses frontières dans le but de les rapatrier sur le territoire chinois, selon le Wall Street Journal qui cite des sources proches du dossier. Jusqu’à présent, Pékin autorisait les entreprises non financières du pays à vendre des obligations libellées en yuan uniquement sur le marché hongkongais, mais restreignait fortement la capacité des sociétés chinoises à emprunter des titres en yuans directement auprès d’établissements étrangers à des fins locales. Un système de quotas pourrait ainsi être mis en place. Li Dongrong, le vice-président de la Banque populaire de Chine (PBOC), avait indiqué au mois de janvier la volonté de la banque centrale de poursuivre le développement des échanges transfrontaliers en renminbi avec une extension des canaux de distribution.
12/04/2012

TD Ameritrade abandonne le Nasdaq pour Nyse Euronext

La société de courtage a annoncé son intention de transférer la cotation de ses actions ordinaires de Nasdaq OMX vers Nyse Euronext. Le changement devrait être effectif dès le 25 avril prochain. TD Ameritrade explique que «compte tenu notre relation actuelle avec Nyse et les nombreux efforts issus de notre collaboration sur plusieurs années, le temps était venu de réaliser ce changement».
12/04/2012

Accélération de l’activité des pays émergents

L’indice synthétique du secteur manufacturier et des services HSBC des pays émergents (HSBC EMI), basé sur les indices PMI nationaux a progressé d’un point à 53,4 au premier trimestre 2012 par rapport au trimestre précédent.

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