In Bahrain, the International Islamic Financial Market (IIFM) and the International Swaps and Derivatives Association, Inc. (ISDA) have announced that they have signed an agreement to promote a new product standard for profit rate swaps (PRS), the ISDA/IIFM Mubaladatul Arbaah, which will be used for Islamic type hedging transactions.The new standard follows the ISDA/IIFM Tahawwui (Hedging) Master Agreements, which provides the segment with a standard contract for management of risk in compliance with Islamic law, released in March 2010.The new agreement sets out a mechanism which allows for the bilateral excchange of profits between the fixed and variable rates, and vice versa.The necessary document has been composed under the direction of the Sharia consulting committee of the IIFM, with Clifford Chance and market actors worldwide.

The Swiss firm UBS on Wednesday announced the departure of several private bankers who had been members of its wealth management teams based in Madrid and Barcelona, Expansión reports.The wealth management division, led by Pablo Díaz, has laid off Juan Roméu, Isabel Alonso, Arturo Barreda and Arantxa Pascual. Meanwhile, Santiago Fuste, who is currently MD, and Patricia de Pablo, head of a team in Madrid, have negotiated their departures.UBS Wealth Management had 70 employees before these layoffs. It is estimated that the retention rate for portfolios overseen by employees leaving the firm will be 80%.

As of the end of 2011, Pioneer had assets under management of EUR162.1bn, down 13.2% compared with their levels as of the end of 2010, when they totalled slightly over EUR183bn, its parent company, UniCredit, has announced in its annual results. The majority of assets under management were in Italy (EUR83bn, down 14.7% year on year), followed by the United States (EUR35bn, -4.3%) and Germany (EUR19bn, -19.2%). In terms of distribution channels, the proportion of captive assets (coming from the UniCredit Group) represented 57% as of the end of 2011, compared with 58% at the end of 2010. In this environment, operating revenues at Pioneer were down 5.6% to EUR787m, and operating profits were down 7.4% to EUR321m. Pre-tax profits totalled EUR297m, down 10.1%.

Natixis Asset Management annonce ce jeudi 29 mars sa réorganisation autour de six expertises de gestion. Celles-ci se composent à la fois d’expertises coeur – Taux Euro, Actions Européennes, Investissements et Solutions Clients - et d’expertises complémentaires à fort potentiel - Investissement Responsable, Structurés et Volatilité, et Global Emergent. En pratique, reprenant le modèle multi-boutiques de Natixis Global Asset Management, six « business units » ont été créées qui se présentent comme des centres de gestion autonomes et responsables de leur processus d’investissement. Pour le reste, ces unités qui seront mises en place au cours des prochains mois - sans entrainer aucun changement dans la gouvernance de Natixis AM - s’appuieront sur la plateforme de distribution mondiale de NGAM et sur des fonctions support mutualisées (contrôle des risques, juridique, middle office, informatique, …). Dans le détail, les « business units » se décomposent en :· Investissements et Solutions Clients. Cette entité réunira à la fois des compétences de gestion, d’ingénierie financière et de relations clients (institutionnels, grandes entreprises, bancassureurs et réseaux du Groupe BPCE (Banque Populaire et Caisse d’Epargne).· Taux Euro (monétaire, souverain, crédit, assurances) et Actions Européennes (small et midcap, grandes capitalisations et gestion assurances) · Investissement Responsable ;· Structurés et Volatilité. Cette entité développera des offres dans les domaines des gestions asymétriques, flexibles, et des indices «intelligents» ;· Global Emergent. Cette entité réunira les expertises de Natixis AM sur les taux et les actions des pays émergents;

Natixis Asset Management on Thursday, 29 March announced that it is reorganizing around six management areas of expertise. These will include core areas – Euro Fixed Income, European Equities, Investments and Client Solutions – and complementary areas of expertise with strong potential – Responsible Investment, Structured Products and Volatility, and Global Emerging Marketts.In practice, based on the multi-boutique model of Natixis Global Asset Mangement, six business units have been created, which will operate as autonomous management centres responsible for their own investment processes. For the rest, these units, which will be created in the course of the coming months, will not bring about any changes to the governance model at Natixis AM, based on the the NGAM global distribution platform and shared support functions (risk controlling, legal, middle office, IT, etc).The business units will include:* Investments and Client Solutions. This unit will include management, wealth engineering and customer relations areas (institutionals, major businesses, banking-insurance companies and networks of the BPCE Group co-operative and savings banks).* Euro Fixed Income (money market, government bonds, credit, insurance), and European Equities (small and midcaps, large caps and insurance management);*Responsible investment;* Structured Products and Volatillity. This entity will develop product ranges in the areas of assymetrical management, flexible management, and ‘smart’ indices;* Global Emerging Markets. This entity will include the expertise of Natixis AM in the areas of fixed income and emerging markets equities.

Natixis Asset Management annonce ce jeudi 29 mars sa réorganisation autour de six expertises de gestion. En pratique, reprenant le modèle multi-boutiques de Natixis Global Asset Management, six « business units » ont été créées qui se présentent comme des centres de gestion autonomes et responsables de leur processus d’investissement. Pour le reste, ces unités qui seront mises en place au cours des prochains mois - sans entrainer aucun changement dans la gouvernance de Natixis AM - s’appuieront sur la plateforme de distribution mondiale de NGAM et sur des fonctions support mutualisées (contrôle des risques, juridique, middle office, informatique, …). Dans le détail, les « business units » se décomposent en :· Investissements et Solutions Clients. Cette entité réunira à la fois des compétences de gestion, d’ingénierie financière et de relations clients (institutionnels, grandes entreprises, bancassureurs et réseaux du Groupe BPCE (Banque Populaire et Caisse d’Epargne).· Taux Euro (monétaire, souverain, crédit, assurances) et Actions Européennes (small et midcap, grandes capitalisations et gestion assurances) · Investissement Responsable ;· Structurés et Volatilité. Cette entité développera des offres dans les domaines des gestions asymétriques, flexibles, et des indices «intelligents» ;· Global Emergent. Cette entité réunira les expertises de Natixis AM sur les taux et les actions des pays émergents;

Fiducial Real Estate SA has signed an agreement with Uffi Participations SAAS, to acquire the Participations Services Investissements Immobiliers SAS (PS2I) company, a statement says. PS2I controls affiliates includes the Uffi Real Estate Asset Management (Uffi REAM) company, an asset management firm specialised in the management of real estate assets for third parties. Uffi REAM managed over EUR1.3bn in assets as of 31 December 2011.

The US asset management firm Janus Capital Group, based in Denver, has opened a representative office in Paris, which will include three salespeople dedicated to French-speaking Europe.The market, which includes France, Geneva, Belgium, Luxembourg and Monaco, has previously been served from London by the Frenchman Sylvain Agar, head of development for French-speaking Euorpe at Janus Capital since 2008. He will now lead the activity from the new office on the Place Vendôme in Paris."The opening of an office in Paris is a sign of Janus’ will to better serve French-speaking institutional and regtail clients,” Agar explains to Newsmanagers, at a time when French-speaking Europe represents over EUR1bn in assets. The new office comes as part of a growth strategy for Janus in Europe, where the firm has already opened four offices (London, Milan, Munich and more recently, the Hague). The firm is aiming to double assets originating outside the United States to represent 20% of total assets by 2015. Currently, Janus has assets under management of USD148bn as of 31 December 2011.Meanwhile, Janus has also added to its team dedicated to the French-speaking countries. Julien Froger has joined the firm as director of sales for French-speaking Europe, from Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management. He will be more particularly in charge of asset management firms, private banks and distribution platforms.At the same time, Olivier Systchenko has been appointed as head of sales at Janus Capital, serving French-speaking institutional clients. Since 2007, he had served as commercial development support functions for Europe and Asia at the firm. He will now be in charge of relationships with institutional investors (pension funds, social protection groups, insurance, companies, mutual insurers).Lastly, the team of three salespeople, led by Agar, will be complemented by a fourth person, who will continue to be based in London: Julie Tedeschi, in charge of customer relationships for French-speaking Europe since 2009.

With Alternative Investment Reporting, J.P. Morgan Worldwide Securities Services has launched an interactive web tool which allows alternative managers (hedge funds, private equity and real estate) to view, analyse and extract their fund administration data from dashboards, workflows and reports. The tool is a part of the J.P. Morgan Access application platform for multiple information, compliance and portfolio management.The new technology facilitates the consolidation of data and production of reports for the full spectrum of alternative products from a single resource, regardless of the structure of the fund. The resource also includes a workflow model which allows clients to monitor their key operational processes.

The US asset management firm State Street Corporation has announced the launch of my.statestreet.com, an “Entity Exposure Monitor Service,” which calculates exposure on the part of asset management firms or investors to a given legal entity with which they have business relationships or which they hold in their portfolios.The service includes monitoring tools which provide an overview of issuer and counterparty risks for all asset classes. The tool also offers ways to set limits and alerts to warn clients about their exposure to a given legal entity. It offers full details and advanced analysis that allows for diversification of exposures and comparison of universes.

The creator of the first S&P 500 ETF (nearly USD100bn in assets), Jim Ross, senior managing director at State Street Global Advisors (SSgA), and global head of SPDR ETF, announced on Wednesday in Paris that in 30 to 60 days, the asset management firm should have finalised the release of three new ETF funds in the areas of strategic asset allocation and absolute returns.There will be a fund of funds with an income strategy (dividends and bond alpha strategies), a global asset allocation ETF, and a «real assets» product launched in partnership with Blackstone. Although the current SPDR range includes only physical replication funds, which reproduce their underlyings either in their entirety or via sampling, Gross has not ruled out the possibility that SSgA may at some point release synthetic replication ETFS, for markets which are difficult to access, or on which liquidity is insufficient, as for example in frontier markets.However, “although one should never say never,” the head of SPDR remains highly circumspect about actively-managed ETFs and leveraged and/or inverse ETFs.At the presentation, held as part of a road show to promote the release in Europe of a UCITS-compliant version of the SPDR S&P 500, Marco Fusco, chairman and CEO of SSgA in France, says that 23 SPDR products were released in Europe last year, bringing the total number of available products in the product range to 36. Since the beginning of 2012, the family of products has attracted 10% of all inflows in Europe (and as much as 19% in February), with inflows equivalent to all of 2011 put together.

The French forum for responsible investment (Forum pour l’investissement responsable or FIR) has added new members to its board of directors and its office, following the general assembly and a meeting of the board of directors, held at the end of March. The union CFDT, represented by Emmanuel Mermet, joins the board and the office, as does Natixis Asset Mangaement, represented by Hervé Guez. The inter-union committee for employee savings (CIES) joins only the board, where it is represented by Jean Conan. Marion de Marcillac of Eiris and Franca Perin from Generali Investments join the office. Bertrand Fournier has been re-elected as president of the FIR. Martial Cozette and Paul de Marcellus (HSBC GAM) have been reappointed to their respective positions as treasurer and vice president, while Estelle Mironesco (Vigeo) is appointed as vice-president. Michel Lemonnier has been appointed as general secretary.

By 30 March, GAM will redeem investments to investors in its fund Star Diversified Market Neutral Credit, which will be liquidated, Das Investment reports.The decision is due to the fact that the administrator of the fund, DCI LLC, is planning to launch a similar product under its own brand name.

Several investors have recently got burnt on their investments in exchange-traded notes (ETN), Agefi reports. An ETN from Credit Suisse, focused on volatility, lost more than 50% in two days, after peaking at 89% over the value of the underlying index, generating about USD340m in losses for investors, including retail investors. Similarly, an ETN from Barclays, focused on natural gas, lost 47% of its value in three days. One professional claims that these disasters tend to “reopen questions about the safety of ETPs,” exchange-traded products, a category which includes ETNs.

The British asset management firm Schroders has received a sales license in Germany for its third conservative fund in its multi-asset class product range, the STS Schroder Global Conservative Fund. The fund of funds, managed by Gregor Hirt (who also manages the STS Schroder Synamic Balanced Fund), actually reproduces the strategy of the Schroder Multi Manager Conservative fund, launched in 2006, which became known as the Global Conservative fund on 7 December 2011. The portfolio is at least 70% defensive, and may be up to 100% defensive in difficult market periods. The objective is to outperform the European money market rate by 150 basis points, with a portfolio of Schroders funds, third-party funds, ETFs, futures, and direct investment in securities. As of the end of January, the fund had nearly EUR100m in assets.CharacteristicsName: STS Schroder Global Conservative FundISIN code: LU0712904506Front-end fee: 4.17%Management commission: 1%Minimal initial subscription: EUR1,000

The Chinese Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) has issued its 71st fund management license to Huachen Mirae, two years after the joint venture applied for the license, Z-Ben Advisors reports.Huachen Trust controls 40% of capital in the firm, while the South Korean Mirae Asset Investment controls 25%, and Buchang Pharma controls 35%. The Huachen Mirae firm has CNY200m in capital.The CSRC has also issued to Huachen Mirae a license to manage seggregated accounts.

Tradition and Nomura on 28 March announced that Amundi has become the most recent of the major providers to join the Navesis-ETF trading platform, with 48 of its most liquid products. The other players already represented on the platform are db x-trackers, ETF Securities, HSBC, iShares, Lyxor ETF and Source.Since its launch in February, Navesis-ETF, which opened on emerging markets in March, has been trading nearly 200 products, including ETFs, ETCs and fixed income products.

The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has announced that it has signed large-scale cooperation agreements with the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority (CIMA) and the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), as part of a long-term strategy to improve supervision of regulated entities operating accorss borders. These agreements come in addition to agreements signed with four Canadian financial market authorities (Quebec, Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia) in 2010 and 2011.

Asian Investor reports that Vanguard Investments is planning to increase its services to institutional investors in Asia. The US firm will target these clients from its Hong Kong office. Last month, the firm recruited Jackson Loi, formerly of Syz & Co, as head of sales to institutionals.

Remontée du prix du pétrole oblige, nombreux s’inquiètent d’un risque inflationniste qu’ils pensent être immédiat. Ces craintes sont précipitées d’un point de vue conjoncturel : l’économie mondiale ne connaît qu’une reprise graduelle et les coûts salariaux unitaires augmentent de moins de 2% par an dans les principales économies de la planète, où les taux de chômage restent bien trop élevés.

Pascal Voisin, son directeur général, s'inspire du modèle multiboutique de sa maison mère Natixis Global AM pour renouer avec la collecte

La chambre de compensation va garder son contrat avec la Bourse, qui préfère le renégocier plutôt que de se lancer dans un projet dur à rentabiliser

Le pôle français de gestion d’actifs de Natixis s’inspire des «boutiques» pour doubler sa collecte 2013-2016, annonce son directeur Pascal Voisin.

La Bourse n'adopte le modèle en silo que pour les dérivés échangés à Londres et sur le continent

La Bourse n'adopte le modèle en silo que pour les dérivés échangés à Londres et sur le continent

Les investisseurs, dont des particuliers, d’un ETN de Credit Suisse axé sur la volatilité ont perdu 340 millions de dollars sur deux jours

Réunis aujourd’hui à New Delhi, les cinq pays vont mettre à l'étude la création de leur propre banque de développement, en complément des institutions existantes. Les opérateurs boursiers des Brics s’apprêtent quant à eux à coopérer dans les dérivés sur indices actions.

Réunis aujourd'hui à New Delhi, les cinq pays cherchent à lancer des projets sur lesquels ils ont des intérêts communs

Le quotidien croit savoir que les deux sociétés américaines de private equity négocient avec la chaîne indienne d’hôpitaux Fortis Healthcare le rachat d’une participation de 15 à 20% pour 250 millions de dollars environ. Carlyle et TPG pourraient acquérir des actions ainsi que de la dette convertible. Le fondateur du groupe indien souhaite par ailleurs céder 6,5% des actions sur le marché.

Selon les calculs d’Omgeo cités par le quotidien, le volume des ordres obligataires traités par voie électronique a bondi de 21% l’an passé, sur fond de craintes des traders de défaillance de la part de leurs contreparties, de volonté de transparence ou de préparation aux nouvelles normes. La part électronique reste plus importante en Europe, alors que dans le secteur du marché de gros les volumes automatisés ont progressé en 2011 de 85% aux Etats-Unis et de 69% en Asie. La plateforme de trading de produits de taux MarketAxess par exemple a vu selon le quotidien sa part de marché globale progresser de 3 points l’an dernier, à 11%.