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28/04/2009

Germany - Goldman Sachs AM has high ambitions

Axel Hörger, head of Goldman Sachs Asset Management (GSAM) for Germany and continental Europe, is aiming for assets of EUR30-40bn in Germany in the long term. This is an ambitious goal, since, as Handelsblatt observes, the first step will be to regain a level of EUR18bn in assets, their peak before the crisis. Assets have now fallen below EUR10bn (institutional investors withdrew a net total of EUR2.2bn in 2008). GSAM has cut staff and closed its German-registered KAG format management firm. Hörger says there is now rising demand for simple and transparent products. GSAM is now planning to focus on funds for private clients via banks and insurance firms. This will mean some recruitments: soon, nearly one third of the firm’s 29 staff will be dedicated to this activity.
28/04/2009

World - Cash management to become a strategic profession

La Tribune reports that cash management has become a strategic financial profession, in a world where liquidity has become scarce. The profession is profitable, the newspaper observes, citing the example of Citigroup, which has seen 15% growth in its net profits for this activity to USD843m in first quarter.
28/04/2009

Switzerland - Reyl AM recruits Maximilian Tomei

Maximilian Tomei, managing partner and CEO of INOKS Capital in Geneva since 2004, has been appointed CEO of Reyl Asset Management (RAM). He will oversee and develop operations related to all funds managed by RAM. The Reyl Funds product range includes directional equities funds, decorrelated equities funds, bond funds, and hedge funds.
28/04/2009

France - BNP Paribas IP: Jacques d'Estais appointed CEO

The responsibilities of Gilles Glicenstein, director and CEO of BNP Paribas Investment Partners, who died last week, will be assumed in the interim by Jacques d’Estais, head of the Investment Solutions unit at BNP Paribas. He will be assisted by Philippe Marchessaux and Pascal Biville, deputy CEOs of BNP Paribas Investment Partners.
28/04/2009

United States - SEC charges Danny Pang with fraud

The SEC has obtained a temporary freeze on the assets of the financier Danny Pang, and the companies Private Equity Management Group Inc. and Private Equity Management Group LLC. The regulator accuses Pang of defrauding investors of hundreds of millions of dollars, the Wall Street Journal reports. The PEM group claims to manage USD4bn in assets, but assets, mostly originating in Taiwan, appear to total under USD1bn.
28/04/2009

Switzerland - 70 layoffs at EIM

EIM, a fund of hedge fund management firm based in Nyon, London, and New York, saw decline of 16% in its assets in 2008, to a total of USD10.9bn, Arpad Busson, executive director of the group, has stated in an interview with Le Temps. To come to terms with these difficulties, EIM has eliminated the distinction between traditional and alternative management. Personnel at EIM will be reduced by 70, or 30%, worldwide.
28/04/2009

United Kingdom - bfinance consulting firm in management buyout

The consulting firm bfinance, specialised in advising financial officers and institutional investors, has been acquired by its own management in an MBO deal which puts the chairman and CEO of the firm, David Vafai, and the management of the company in control of 100% of its capital. The operation, financed by BMS Finance, represents an exit for the current shareholders in the firm, Carlyle Group and Net Partners, whose stakes in the capital of bfinance date back to its inception in 1999. The firm, which has an Investment Consulting division dedicated to asset management and manager selection, is growing at a rate of more than 30% per year, and has operations in over 20 countries.
28/04/2009

World - Diversified funds suffer due to market conditions in Q1

In January-March, BNY Mellon Asset Servicing reports that diversified funds have suffered average losses of 7.9%, compared with 3.4% in fourth quarter 2008. This represents the fifth consecutive quarterly loss, while the last positive result was a 1% gain in fourth quarter 2007. This prolonged period of losses has also affected results over one and three years, which come to -20.5% and -6.6%, respectively. Over five and ten years, performance works out to 3.2% and 1.4%.
28/04/2009

United States - Blackstone recruits Tom Kelly

Tom Kelly, managing director at KEMA Partners, a consulting and investment banking services firm specialised in serving young growth start-up businesses, has been appointed managing director of the corporate advisory group at the Blackstone Group. He will spearhead a new initiative to provide private fundraising services to businesses in the form of private investments and loans, for both publicly traded and privately owned client businesses.
28/04/2009

Austria - Michael Berger released

Fondsprofessionell reports, citing Profil, that Michael Berger, founder of the US hedge fund Manhattan Investment Fund, has been released after 21 months of preventive detention at Josefstadt prison in Vienna. Berger was sentenced to six and a half years of prison in the United States in 2002 for a fraud which stripped 300 victims of USD400m.
28/04/2009

Germany - Schroders adds to sales team

Schroders Germany has recruited two assistants for its sales team. Gülcan Elmas joins the private cilents team, led by Clemens Bertram; she was previuosly at F&C Asset Management in London. From 1 May, Tobias Eppler will join the major accounts team in a support position for Joachim Mareike and Alexander Prawitz. He was previously in the structured products distribution service at BHF-Bank.
28/04/2009

Europe - Second wind for convertibles

April was a good month for European convertible bonds: roughly USD3.21bn were raised, according to statistics from Dealogic reported in the Wall Street Journal. Bankers estimate that convertible issues will remain dynamic for the rest of the quarter, so long as equities markets remain stable.
28/04/2009

United Kingdom - London becoming a threat to offshore financial centres

The dominance of offshore asset management centres such as Luxembourg and Dublin may face a threat from the United Kingdom, following the passage of a series of tax relief measures, Financial Times Fund Management reports. The British government has introduced a system by which tax is paid only by investors, and not by funds. It has also created a list of financial instruments in which funds may invest without having their activities classed as ?trading,? which would make them subject to capital gains tax.
28/04/2009

Europe - Fund selection will be increasingly outsourced, says Allfunds

In an interview with Citywire, Borja Largo, CIO of Allfunds Bank, predicts that many institutions will move to outsource their fund analysis in the future. He estimates that the only fund selection entities which will prove viable in the long term will be those with more than EUR1bn to EUR1.5bn in assets.
28/04/2009

World - Hedge funds may begin outsourcing administration

Hedge funds may be obliged to outsource their administration in order to reassure clients, the Financial Times reports. In a sector which has recently confronted some difficulties due to the Madoff scandal and the Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers bankruptcies, investors are increasingly concerned about compensation risks, and are putting pressure on hedge funds to alter their practices.
28/04/2009

United Kingdom - Fortis Investments: Wael Elkhouly takes over as head of Global Infrastructure Fund management team

Fortis Investments has appointed Wael Elkhouly as head of asset management for the Global Infrastructure Fund team, based in London. The team includes 19 members, under the responsibility of Hans Meissner. Elkhouly, a British-Egyptian dual citizen, previously worked five years at Citigroup, where he was a part of the infrastructure consulting group. Before Citigroup, Elkhouly spent ten years in the dedicated investment banking unit of the Bechtel group.
28/04/2009

United States - Invesco organizes participation in PPIP

Invesco Ltd and its affiliate WL Ross on Monday announced that they are planning to invest up to EUR1bn in the Public-Private Investment Program (PPIP) to revive the mortgage market in the United States. Invesco will provide the expertise of its 120-member bond team, which manages USD159bn in assets, while WL Ross will contribute expertise in distressed investments. The firms will be supported by the Le Frak Organization, along with several property developers who will be co-investors. Assured Guaranty Ltd, a sub-prime debt servicing business, and American Home Mortgage Servicing Inc, a credit monoliner, two firms in which the group owns stakes, will contribute their expertise in particular aspects of this type of investment. In addition, strategic partnerships have been signed with the woman-owned securities firm Muriel Siebert and Co, with the investment advising firm Williams Capital Group, and with Jackson Securities, an affiliate of Atlanta Life Financial Group.
28/04/2009

Carmignac and Threadneedle finish top in rankings

According to the most recent rankings by Feri Fund Rating, Carmignac, Vitruvius and Dr. Jens Erhardt Kapital all succeeded in having the entirety (100%) of their funds on sale in Germany (9, 8, and 9 funds, respectively) ranked in the top category, which includes only A and B-rated products. The rankings concern managers with fewer than 25 funds on sale in Germany. The next two firms in the rankings are Star Capital and State Street, with ratios of 87.5% and 70.8%.In the rankings of management firms with more than 25 funds on sale, the top three finishers are Threadneedle with 67.9% of its funds rated A or B (19 out of 28), followed by BNY Mellon Asset Management with 58.5% (31 funds out of 53) and Union Investment (co-operative banks) with 50% (44 out of 88).
28/04/2009

Losses for asset and wealth management at Deutsche Bank

For January-March 2009, the asset and wealth management (AWM) division of Deutsche Bank has posted pre-tax losses of EUR173m, compared with pre-tax profits of EUR188m in the corresponding period of last year. Invested assets for the division at the end of March totalled EUR627bn, close to their levels at the end of December. Positive currency effects compensated for net outflows of EUR3bn from asset management and EUR1bn from wealth management, as well as for depreciation of the value of portfolios due to falling markets. Earnings for the AWM division contracted by 49% to EUR515bn, due to falling revenues from brokerage and management due to falling markets and a slowdown in client transactions. Activities were also negatively affected by write-downs for RREEF activities.
28/04/2009

Questions as to SRI management in fixed-income products

La Tribune reports that SRI is not strongly represented in the fixed income product category, despite its recent and strong development in the money market management industry. Its presence in products of this type is the subject of some debate within some management firms. At HSBC Global Asset Management, for example, questions are being raised about whether it is worthwhile to combine SRI, whose effectiveness can only be judged over a long term, with a type of management which by definition is restricted to a horizon of only a few months.
27/04/2009
Fonds

CAAM "européanise" son Dynarbitrage Actions

Crédit Agricole Asset Management (CAAM) a lancé au sein de sa Sicav internationale luxembourgeoise le compartiment CAAM Funds Equity Statistical Arbitrage (EUR), qui est une variante européenne du CAAM Dynarbitrage Actions et qui est destiné à la clientèle institutionnel. Il s’agit d’un fonds d’arbitrage statistique long/short actions dont l’objectif est de générer une performance la plus décorellée possible de l'évolution des marchés. Ce produit (200-400 lignes), qui allie des stratégies de retour à la moyenne (mean reverting) et de suivi de tendance (momentum), est conforme à la directive OPCVM III. Il est censé surperformer l’Eonia de 400 points de base par an pour un horizon minimum de placement de 4 ans, avec une fourchette ex-ante de valeur à risque inférieure à 10 %. L'équipe de gestion arbitrage actions comprend trois gérants et un analyste. La souscription minimale est fixée à 0,5 million de dollars. En plus de la commission de souscription et de la commission de gestion, CAAM facture sur ce produit 30 % maximum de la surperformance au-delà de l’EONIA capitalisation majoré de 400 points de base par an.
Fonds
27/04/2009

Les fonds de pension ont perdu 20% de leurs actifs dans la crise

Les fonds de pension ont connu une chute sévère de leurs actifs, d’environ 5400 milliards de dollars, soit plus de 20% à la fin de 2008, en raison de la crise financière, selon un récent rapport de l’OCDE. Cette chute a créé une pression importante pour le financement des plans de retraite à rendement défini et a créé des problèmes sérieux aux souscripteurs de plans à contribution définie («defined contribution» ou DC) proches de l'échéance de la retraite, provoquant une défiance à l'égard de ce dernier système. Selon le rapport, qui formule des recommandations, les gestionnaires de fonds de pension auraient pu se protéger plus efficacement de la crise en combinant une meilleure gestion et des règles de contrôle du risque plus strictes.
27/04/2009

Davegårdh & Kjalls lance un fonds écolo

Lundi dernier, la société de gestion suédoise Davegårdh & Kjälls a lancé son troisième fonds, appelé Sol, vind & vatten (soleil, vent et eau), rapporte Privata Affärer. Sur les trois premiers jours, l’entité a recueilli 10 millions de couronnes dans le fonds et a déjà investi près de la moitié. Le nouveau fonds se concentrera sur les entreprises écologiques nordiques.
27/04/2009

Santander Banca Privada va devenir Santander Patrimonios

Selon Cotizalia, le président du groupe Santander, Emilio Botín, a decidé de changer le nom de Santander Banca Privada pour celui de Santander Patrimonios, en raison de la mauvaise image du concept de «banque privée» dans le pays, liée aux scandales Lehman et Madoff.
27/04/2009
Fonds

Un quart des nouveaux fonds lancés en 2009 sont des garantis actions

Les gestionnaires espagnols estiment que le produit vedette des prochains mois sera le fonds d’actions garanti dont le capital est protégé pour ceux qui ne font pas confiance à l'évolution de la Bourse et qui sont exposés aux actions pour pouvoir profiter d’une possible remontée de cette classe d’actifs. Paula Mercado, directrice de la recherche chez VDOS Stochastics a indiqué à Expansión que 25 % des nouveaux fonds ou des fonds dont la garantie a été renouvelée ces trois derniers mois font partie de cette catégorie qui représente 17 % de l’encours total des fonds en Espagne. A mesure qu’il devient plus cher de renouveler l'épargne captée sur les dépôts bancaires, les commerciaux vont intensifier leurs efforts pour placer ces fonds garantis actions, estime Sebastión Laura, associé d’AFI. Pourtant les experts préfèrent les fonds garantis obligataires, qui sont plus rentables pour le souscripteur, mais qui, commercialement, risquent de faire perdre des souscriptions à leurs homologues actions. Depuis le début de l’année, les établissements qui ont attiré le plus de souscriptions avec les garantis actions sont Mapfre, La Caixa, le Santander (qui en a même lancé onze nouveaux), Bankinter (qui en a lancé 5), suivis du BBVA, de Crediges, du Banco Sabadell et de BBK.
Fonds
27/04/2009
Fonds

SGAM commercialise sa gamme de fonds à échéance

Selon Funds People, SGAM va commercialiser en Espagne sa gamme Target Fund, comprenant deux fonds UCITS III investis en obligations privées : Credit 2012 est à échéance de trois ans et Credit 2014 de cinq ans, leur période de commercialisation durant jusqu’au 19 juin 2009.
Fonds

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