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22/01/2009

Luxembourg - CSSF releases list of funds affected by Madoff

In an email message addressed to the Luxembourg investment fund association (ALFI), the Luxembourg financial sector surveillance commission (CSSF) listed 17 Luxembourg-registered collective investment organisms (OPC) which have been affected by the Bernard Madoff fraud case, Les Echos reports. At the top of the list are American sub-funds of the Herald, Luxinvest and Luxalpha funds.
22/01/2009

France - DWS releases Commodity Plus sub-fund

DWS Investments (Deutsche Bank) announced on Tuesday that it has released the Commodity Plus sub-fund of the Luxembourg Sicav DWS Invest (see Newsmanagers of 22 September 2006) in France. The product is a commodities fund which was launched in 2005. Assets currently total EUR123m, while they totalled EUR350m nearly two and a half years ago.Olivier Renard, head of DWS Investments in France, states that the fund is ?one of the rare products available on the French market which offers direct and diversified exposure to commodities with daily net asset value reporting.? The timing is good, he says, since the Commodity Plus offers investors a way to position themselves at the bottom of the cycle, and thus to benefit from a rebound on commodity prices in the long term.
22/01/2009

EU - Toxic assets: Brussels may publish guidelines

The European Commission may soon publish new guidelines for bailout plans put in place by member states to help banks to resolve their problems with toxic assets. The goal of the guidelines would be to avoid creating competitive distortions, Les Echos reports.
22/01/2009

Germany - MLP acquires ZSH

All shareholders in the financial brokerage firm ZSH Have agreed to sell their shares, totalling about EUR11.3m, to MLP. The distributor of financial products will additionally pay up to EUR0.6m, depending on results at ZSH up to 31 March 2009.ZSH has about 80 client advisers and about 50,000 high net worth clients, who include many members of the medical professions.MLP states that the largest shareholders in ZSH were the founder, Wolfgang Zech, and the insurance firms Axa Lebensversicherung and Alte Leipziger Lebensversicherung, who together held 84% of capital in the firm.
22/01/2009

United States - Madoff: irregularities could easily have been detected

According to a study published recently by Riskdata, cited by the Financial Times, returns for the hedge fund managed by Bernard Madoff should have raised questions due to the ?bias ratio,? a mathematical measurement which identifies irregularities in the distribution of a series of returns. The study also claims that the comparison of Madoff’s risk profile with those of his counterparts should have shown that the management style he claimed to follow was not the same as what he practiced.
22/01/2009

World - Assets in hedge funds contract by one quarter in half a year

AGEFI Switzerland reports that, according to Hedge Fund Research (HFR), assets under management at hedge funds declined by USD315bn, of which USD152bn was due to net redemptions, in October-December. At the end of 2008, assets had thus fallen to USD1.4trn, from USD1.93trn six months earlier, a decline of one quarter.According to HedgeFund.net, the contraction was as much as 36%, bringing assets to USD1.84trn. In fourth quarter, net redemptions and fund closures represented USD471bn, compared with only USD185bn of capital losses due to negative market effects.
22/01/2009

Spain - Santander revises valuation of portfolio for its real estate fund

The Santander Banif Inmobiliaro fund will not be closing, but the value of its portfolio will undergo an extraordinary revision, which will have an impact on its total net asset value, Cinco Días reports. The product is the largest Spanish real estate fund, with 69,000 subscribers and assets currently reported at EUR3.4bn, though this figure will be adjusted to reflect the reality of a market in crisis.
22/01/2009

United States - Heavy losses for two Deutsche Bank hedge funds

The Süddeutsche Zeitung reports that the hedge funds Deutsche Bank CQ Capital and Deutsche Bank Distressed Opportunities, available to high net worth private clients in the United States, have seen respective losses of 47.2% and 42.4% for last year (while the HFRX hedge fund index shows an average loss of 23.3% for last year). Minimal subscription for this type of fund is USD250,000. All hedge funds from Deutsche Bank on sale in the United States put together represent assets of about USD8bn.
22/01/2009

United States - CalPERS changes top management

The California public employees’ retirement system (CalPERS, USD178bn in assets) has a new CEO as of 12 January, in the person of Anne Stausboll. She replaces Ken Marzion, who served in the position in the interim since the departure of Fred Buenostro in June. Stausboll began at CalPERS as chief investment operating officer, then in April 2008 became interim CIO, after the departure of Russell Reed. She was previously chief deputy treasurer of the State of California.Meanwhile, CalPERS has announced the arrival in March of Joseph A. Dear, executive director of the Washington State Investment Board (WSIB) and chairman of the Council of Institutional Investors, as CIO. He will supervise 220 investment professionals.
22/01/2009

Germany - Barbara Knoflach joins board at BVI

Barbara A. Knoflach, chairwoman of the board at SEB Asset Management AG and a member of the board of directors at SEB Invstment GmbH, has been elected as a board member of the German BVI association of management firms.The BVI association on Thursday announced that Knoflach will finish out the term of Heiko Bech, until autumn 2011. Beck left the board of directors at Commerz Real Investmentgesellschaft to take up a new position in the retail and professional banking division at Commerzbank.
22/01/2009

United States - Moody's downgrades State Street

Moody’s Investors Service has lowered its senior non-guaranteed rating for State Street Corp to A1 from Aa3, and maintained a negative outlook on the rating. Standard & Poor’s lowered its rating of the firm the previous day, the Wall Street Journal reports. The move is due to an increase in latent capital losses present in the State Street portfolio, as well as portfolios that the group manages for clients. On Wednesday, shares in State Street gained 15% on rumours of a potential merger, to USD17.07, after falling 59% in trading on Tuesday.
22/01/2009

Germany - TMW Pramerica keeps Weltfonds closed to redemptions

The Munich-based management firm TMW Pramerica Property Investment has announced that it will not be able to reopen its open-ended real estate fund TWM Immobilieon Weltfonds to redemptions at this time. The closure of the fund took place on 28 October 2008. To keep up with redemption demands, the fund (EUR1bn as of the end of October) will be obliged to sell assets. In order not to sell its properties below their value, the manager has extended its redemption suspension until the end of October 2009, while it retains the option to extend the measure for a further year after that. TMW Pramerica has, however, decided to recommence payment of dividends to retirement plans, but will pay these out of its own capital, and not out of the fund’s assets, in order to comply with a directive from the German financial surveillance authority (BaFin).
22/01/2009

United States - SEC accuses manager of USD300m fraud

The Securities and Exchange Commission has accused Arthur Nadel, a hedge fund manager who has gone missing, of inflating the value of investments in six funds he advised by USD300m, the Financial Times reports. The real value of the assets is only USD506,000.
22/01/2009

United States - Andrew S. Doman becomes CEO of Russell Investments

Russell Investments has announced that Andrew S. Doman has been appointed CEO and member of the board, effective 2 February. He will replace John Schlifske, who is president and CEO, and who will be returning to his position as executive vice president at Northwestern Mutual, the parent company of Russell, after serving in the interim as head of the management firm (USD150bn in assets as of the end of December), following the departure of Craig Ueland.Andrew S. Doman was most recently CFO for European asset management activities at McKinsey in the United Kingdom.
22/01/2009

United Kingdom - RAB appoints new CIO

RAB Capital is making changes to its management, after announcing a decline of 74% in its assets in annual terms, to USD1.9bn as of the end of December, the Financial Times reports. Charles Kirwan-Taylor, formerly a member of the board of directors in charge of marketing, becomes CIO, replacing Philip Richards, who takes over as manager of the Special Situations and Global Mining funds.
22/01/2009

Germany - Redemption freeze does not cause tensions

Three open-ended real estate funds (CS Euroreal, Morgan Stanley P2 Value and TMW Immobilien Weltfonds) have already announced that they will be extending suspensions on redemptions for up to nine months, but the move is not triggering a crisis of confidence, the Frankfurter Allgemenine Zeitung reports. In the next few days, decisions are expected from DEGI (Aberdeen), SEB Immobilien and KanAm, but financial sector observers are predicting that redemption freezes will be kept in place. The funds which have remained open, at Deutsche Bank, Deka, Union and Commerz Real, are showing total liquidity ratios of 15% to 31%, while the legal minimum is 5%.
22/01/2009

France - FRR selects BGI

The French national pension reserve fund, the Fonds de Réserve pour les Retraites (FRR), has selected Barclays Global Investors Limited to manage an equities portfolio of Euro zone large and midcaps (passive management based on an index weighted for fundamental factors). The mandate is for a four-year period, renewable for one year, and the indicative size of the allocation is EUR1bn.The selection follows the launch by the FRR on 16 April 2008 of a restricted RFP which proceeded in three rounds, to renew a portion of its mandates invested in European equities. The selection process will continue with the second round (European small caps - active management).
22/01/2009

World - Institutional investor morale rebounds, according to State Street

As a Merrill Lynch survey has also found, institutional investors are regaining some of their calm, according to the State Street Global Markets confidence index, which has risen 12.1 points in January to 60.3, from a corrected level of 48.2 in December (up from the previously announced 48). The overall rise was largely the result of a rise of 21.2 points in the confidence index for North American institutional investors, after a record fall in December from 51.8 to 30.6 points (in corrected figures). The confidence of European investors has improved by 6.7 points, to 73.0. In Asia, confidence has dipped slightly, bringing the index from 86.6 to 86.3 points.Ken Froot, the Harvard University professor who developed the index with State Street Associates, says the rise in the global index for January is the largest increase since August 2007, which is not very surprising after its record decline in December. Although institutional investors in fourth quarter 2008 never showed as high an interest in high risk assets as they now do, Froot warns that it remains to be seen whether these reallocations are motivated by long-term convictions about the value of these assets.
22/01/2009

United States - Operating profit up at BlackRock

Net profit at BlackRock fell last year by 21% compared with 2007, to USD419m, or USD5.91 per share, on revenues up 5% to USD5.06bn. However, operating profit increased 23%, or 9.5% after adjustments, to USD1.59bn. Financial losses are due to co-investments with clients and seed capital for new products. Net profit in fourth quarter fell to USD53m from USD322.44m in the corresponding period of last year.As of 31 December, assets totalled USD1.30715trn, compared with USD1.2586trn at the end of September, and USD1.35664trn twelve months previously. Net subscriptions totalled USD167.6bn for the year as a whole, and USD129.06bn in fourth quarter. However, market and currency effects were negative to the tune of USD188.95bn and USD28.15bn, respectively, of which USD64.54bn and USD15.97bn in the fourth quarter.
21/01/2009

Espagne - EuroCCP vient concurrencer Iberclear

European Central Counterparty (EuroCCP), filiale européenne de l’américain Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation, a annoncé mardi qu’elle lancera le 16 février ses services à bas prix de compensation et de règlement sur les actions espagnoles en complément de la plate-forme de négociation Turquoise, rapporte Cinco Días.
21/01/2009

Espagne - Santander doit provisionner ? 2 milliards sur Fortis et RBS, estime le marché

Les analystes estiment que les déboires boursiers des alliés du Santander dans l’acquisition d’ABN Amro, RBS et Fortis, sont à l’origine de moins-values qui devraient avoir obligé l’espagnol à provisionner plus de 2 milliards d’euros au titre de l’exercice 2008, selon Cinco Días. A fin 2007, le Santander avait déclaré détenir 2,3 % de RBS et 2,1 % de Fortis pour un total de 2,26 milliards d’euros. A fin octobre, la banque espagnole avait déjà passé 1 milliard d’euros de dépréciation d’actifs sur ces participations.
21/01/2009

Espagne - Telefónica et Iberdrola sollicitent le marché

Telefónica a profité de la réouverture des marchés de la dette pour placer un emprunt obligataire de 2 milliards d’euros, qui ont été placés en l’espace d’une heure et demie seulement, selon Cinco Días. L’emprunt a une échéance de cinq ans et le taux d’intérêt est de 250 points de base supérieur aux midswaps, ce qui correspond environ à 5,50 %. La demande s’est située entre 6,5 milliards et 7 milliards d’euros. Le consortium de placement était dirigé par Barclays Capital, BBVA, BNP Paribas, Calyon, HSBC et Royal Bank of Scotland.D’autre part, une semaine après avoir placé pour 1 milliard d’euros de dette, Iberdrola a lancé un emprunt de 500 millions de livres à 15 ans avec un spread de 290 points de base sur les gilts à échéance 2025.
21/01/2009

Etats-Unis - Citigroup réduit son dividende

Comme l’avait exigé le gouvernement américain qui lui a fourni en novembre 20 milliards de dollars d’assistance, Citigroup a annoncé mardi soir qu’il abaisse son dividende à 1 cent par action, contre 16 cents. Ce dividende sera payable le 27 février aux actionnaires enregistrés aux 2 février. Cette réduction de la distribution permet à la banque de conserver environ 817,5 millions de dollars par trimestre, si l’on compte que l’encours d’actions Citigroup se situe à environ 5,45 milliards d’unités (fin décembre).
21/01/2009

Etats-Unis - Madoff : la justice s'intéresse à Frank DiPascali

Frank DiPascali Jr a été pendant plus de trente ans le plus proche lieutenant de Bernard Madoff. Il était le patron du négoce des options sur actions et le point de contact pour les clients du conseil en investissement, auxquels on disait que c'était lui qui exécutait leurs ordres, rapporte The Wall Street Journal. A présent, il est le point de contact potentiel de l’enquête sur la fraude Madoff, mais il n’a pas été inculpé, alors que Bernard Madoff est inculpé au pénal pour fraude sur la valeurs mobilières et a affirmé avoir agi seul.
21/01/2009

Etats-Unis - Plongeon des financières en Bourse

Les actions des plus grands noms de la banque américaine ont dévissé mardi, les investisseurs craignant que l’administration Obama ne soit obligée de nationaliser les établissements les plus durement affectés, expropriant ainsi les actionnaires, rapporte The Wall Street Journal. Certains titres ont perdu 20 % et se sont retrouvés à leur plus bas depuis plus de 10 ans. C’est le cas de Citigroup, à 2,80 dollars (- 20 %) tandis que l’action Bank of America plongeait de 29 % à 5,10 dollars. Quant à State Street, pourtant réputée solide, son action s’est crashée de 59 % après l’annonce de presque 9 milliards de dollars de moins-values latentes.
21/01/2009

Europe - Court terme : l?écart des taux entre la France et l?Allemagne se réduit

Selon l"Agefi, l'écart de taux s"amenuise pour les très courtes échéances. Mais, «sur les maturités 2, 5 et 10 ans, la liquidité plus importante dont jouissent les obligations allemandes de référence explique les larges spreads entre OAT et Bund», explique notamment René Defossez, stratégiste taux chez Natixis, dans les colonnes du quotidien numérique.
21/01/2009

Europe - Titrisation : reflux des spreads

Selon l"Agefi, «les marges de crédit en Europe des titres adossés à des actifs (ABS) notés «AAA», selon les portefeuilles de sous-jacents, se sont resserrées, en l’espace d’une semaine, de 30 et 80 pb». Ce resserrement des spreads est encourageant car il s"est effectué dans des volumes relativement importants, souligne notamment le quotidien numérique.
21/01/2009

France - L?immobilier retrouve la faveur des assureurs

Selon l"Agefi, citant la société d'études IPD et l’Agence régionale de développement Ile-de-France, 60% des investisseurs interrogés prévoient d’investir plus dans l"immobilier en 2009 qu’en 2008. «Ainsi, 100 % des SCPI et 71 % des assureurs prévoient d’augmenter leurs acquisitions cette année», précise notamment le quotidien numérique.
21/01/2009

France - Banques : Lagarde annonce 10,5 milliards d?aides supplémentaires

Selon le site Boursorama, qui se fait l"écho d"une dépêche Reuters, Christine Lagarde, ministre de l"économie, a indiqué, mercredi matin sur RTL, que la Société générale, BNP Paribas, le Crédit agricole, les Banques populaires, les Caisses d’Epargne ainsi que le Crédit mutuel vont profiter d"une nouvelle aide de 10,5 milliards d"euros.
21/01/2009

France - Affaire Madoff : le parquet de Paris ouvre une enquête préliminaire

Mardi soir, le parquet de Paris a ouvert une enquête préliminaire, qui fait suite au dépôt d’une plainte contre X, jeudi dernier par une épargnante de soixante-six ans qui a investi 500.000 euros en parts Luxalpha Sicav via Generali Patrimoine et VP Assurances (300.000 euros en contrat d’assurance-vie et 200.000 euros de parts du fonds), liées à Madoff, rapporte Les Echos.

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