Unigestion, société de gestion indépendante totalisant 10,4 milliards d’euros d’encours sous gestion (au 30.09.2013), annonce aujourd’hui avoir été retenue pour la gestion d’un fonds d’actions suisses d’IST Fondation d’investissement pour la prévoyance en faveur du personnel. Unigestion aura la responsabilité de la gestion du nouveau fonds « IST2 Aktien Schweiz Minimum Varianz ». Première fondation d’investissement indépendante de Suisse, IST gère des capitaux de prévoyance représentant un volume d’environ 4,7 milliards d’euros pour le compte de 519 caisses de pension privées et de droit public suisses. S’exprimant au sujet du choix d’Unigestion, Markus Anliker, Directeur d’IST, déclare : « Nos investisseurs nous ont signifié leur volonté de mettre en place une stratégie d’actions défensives. Le marché obligataire n'étant pas attractif dans le contexte économique actuel, la place des actions dans la stratégie de nos clients a tendance à être surpondérée. Cette nouvelle stratégie de placement contribuera à réduire le risque d’investissement provenant des actions. C’est pourquoi nous avons hâte de compléter notre offre de produits avec la stratégie d’actions suisse d’Unigestion ».

La Mutuelle Générale a lancé une consultation interne afin de déterminer une nouvelle segmentation de ses actifs. Les quatre gérants ayant un mandat avec la troisième mutuelle française (Covéa Finance, La Banque Postale AM, OFI AM et Rothschild&Cie) ont proposé une nouvelle allocation, qui est actuellement à l'étude par les équipes de Christophe Harrigan, arrivé en tant que directeur financier en février dernier. Sans présager du résultat de cette consultation, qui est en cours de décision et sera connu en début d’année 2014, le nombre d’intervenants devrait être réduit, afin de mieux contrôler la gestion des 1,9 milliard d’actifs dont dispose La Mutuelle Générale. Certains des gérants choisis pourraient se voir attribuer des mandats plus importants, puisque les actifs en gestion directe devraient être totalement externalisés, à l’exception des poches « immobilier » et « private equity ». Une renégociation des frais de gestion est aussi envisagée dans le cadre de cette consultation interne. En revanche, il n’est pas prévu de confier de mandats à un nouvel entrant.

La Commission européenne a ouvert un bilan approfondi de l’excédent courant durablement élevé de la balance commerciale allemande pour voir s’il reflète des déséquilibres importants. L’Allemagne affiche depuis 2007 un excédent courant supérieur à 6% du produit intérieur brut (PIB), un niveau que Bruxelles juge excessif et pouvant constituer une menace pour la stabilité de la zone euro. En septembre, il a atteint 19,7 milliards d’euros, soit plus de 8% du produit intérieur brut de 2012, le niveau le plus élevé du monde. Cette situation avait déclenché les critiques des Etats-Unis et de l’Union européenne, qui reprochent à l'économie allemande d'être trop dépendante de l’exportation. Ils demandent à Berlin de soutenir davantage la demande intérieure afin que la croissance du pays repose sur des bases plus saines et joue son rôle de locomotive pour le reste de l’Europe. Le Luxembourg est également concerné par les «examens approfondis» ouverts par Bruxelles.

La Banque centrale européenne pourrait commencer à acheter des actifs ou ramener son taux de dépôt en territoire négatif si nécessaire afin de porter l’inflation au niveau de l’objectif fixé par la banque centrale, a déclaré au Wall Street Journal Peter Praet, membre du directoire de la BCE. «La capacité de bilan de la banque centrale peut être utilisée. Ceci inclut des achats directs que toute banque centrale est en mesure de réaliser», a-t-il expliqué.

L’Etat devrait tenir ses dépenses en 2013 et ramener comme prévu l’ensemble des déficits publics à 4,1% du PIB, selon le projet de loi de finances rectificative présenté en conseil des ministres. Le déficit budgétaire de l’Etat devrait s'établir à 71,9 milliards d’euros, 3,2 milliards d’euros de dépenses supplémentaires étant compensées par des annulations de crédits, soit une amélioration de 15 milliards par rapport à 2012. Les dépenses de l’Etat hors charge de la dette et pensions de retraite devraient atteindre comme prévu 279 milliards d’euros et les recettes seraient conformes aux prévisions actualisées lors de présentation du projet de budget 2014.

Last month, the daily trading volume of on-book trades on ETFs on the European markets on NYSE Euronext fell to EUR192.4m in September, after an increase of 14.2% in August. Compared with October 2012, it has fallen by 13.5%.The median spread last month totalled 25.3 basis points, compared with 28.1 basis points in September 2013, and 29 basis points in October 2012.As of the end of October, the European markets of NYSE Euronext listed 557 ETFs 645 times. Three new funds were added to trading in October, two from Lyxor and one from EasyETF.

The British boutique James Hambro & Partners has recruited Christopher Macklin, a former portfolio manager from Schroders Private Bank, as business development manager, Fundweb reports.Macklin, whose primary mission will be to develop activities with clients, will report directly to Tim Broughton.Assets under management and advised by Hambro & Partners total GBP1.2bn.

Net inflows to equity funds are on track to reach their highest levels since 2000, according to the most recent edition of the Pridham Report. According to statistics from the British investment management association (IMA), net inflows to equity funs have already topped GBP8bn in the first nine months of the year. In third quarter, Standard Life Investments tops the rankings for sales with net inflows of GBP819.9m. It is followed by Schroders with GBP622.1m, Artemis (GBP498.5m), Henderson (GBP481.9m) and BlackRock (GBP471.8m).

Fund managers and analysts at SAC Capital Advisors are in talks with competing hedge fund firms, including Moore Capital Management, to join these companies as SAC prepares to close its London office, the Wall Street Journal reports, citing sources familiar with the matter. In addition to Moore, SAC employees have been in talks with Millennium Management, BlueCrest Capital Management and Balyazny Asset Management.

Schroders on 13 November announced its decision to bring its convertible bond management in-house, which since the beginning of 2008 has been outsourced to an external partner, the Swiss firm Fisch Asset Management.Peter Reinmuth, manager of the current “star” funds of the range, Schroder ISF Convertible Bond and Schroder ISF Asian Convertible Bond, will join the British asset management firm on 29 November 2013. he will be accompanied by two other experts from Fisch AM (including a member of the trading team), as well as an external manager, all of whom will join the British group by the end of Npvember to manage existing vehicles. The management team will be distributed between Zurich and Singapore, and will be placed under the responsibility of the Frenchman Philippe Lespinard, CIO Fixed Income at Schroders.Schroders has a volume of assets under management of nearly EUR1.5bn in convertible bonds, and as of 2013 has posted net inflows of over EUR500m to this asset class.

Domenico Siniscalco has resigned from the chairmanship of Assogestioni, the Italian association of asset managers, Il Sole – 24 Ore reports. The decision was taken in order to avoid a “potential conflict of interests” between his position as chairman of the association of asset management firms, and his role as head of Morgan Stanley, at the time of the reorganization at Telecom Italia. Morgan Stanley is advising the telecommunications firm on its sales of assets, and for an issue of convertible bonds, but these operations are contested by minority shareholders in Telecom Italia.Domenico Siniscalco will be replaced by his vice chairman at Assogestioni, Giordano Lombardo, president of Pioneer, until the convocation of a general assembly.

The European private equity investor 3i on 11 November announced that it had completed its acquisition of the intrastructure operation of the British Barclays group, at Barclays Infrastructure Funds Management.The activity includes four private funds, which invest in British and European PPPs as well as in energy projects, and which have assets under management of GBP780m.The Barclays entity will be renamed as 3i BIFM, and will be integrated into the 3i infrastructure activity led by Cressida Hogg. The team dedicated to infrastructure will be based at the London and Paris offices of 3i.

Rob Geeraets, director of institutional sales at F&C, after working at Lombard Odier and Kas Bank, has been recruited as director for the newly-created position of head of distribution at Affiliated Managers Group (AMG) for Benelux, Fonds Nieuws reports. Geeraets will report to Jenny Segel, director of distribution for Europe at AMG.

The Lyxor Hedge Fund Index posted a positive performance of 1.58% in October (+4.80% YTD).Equity strategies generated strong performance. L/S Equity Long bias was up 1.6% in October (13% YTD).The CTA Long Term returned 4.03%), but is down 2.37% year to date.

BNY Mellon has been awarded a Capital Markets Services licence by the Monetary Authority of Singapore for its new dedicated Singapore-based subsidiary to provide fund management services in Singapore. The licence was approved on 11, November 2013.With the new licence, the Singapore subsidiary, BNY Mellon Investment Management Singapore Pte. Limited, will be able to conduct a full range of investment management activities, including research, portfolio management, marketing and sales of collective investment schemes. BNY Mellon Investment Management has been offering global investment solutions to institutional investors in the region through its investment boutiques.BNY Mellon employs over 450 people in the city.

The index provider Solactive AG on 12 November announced the appointment of Barbara Mahe as head of public relations (PR) and marketing, from 1 November 2013.Mahe, who will be based in London, previously worked for S&P Dow Jones Indices, as PR manager.

Ulrich Köhne has decided “for personal reasons” to resign from his position as a managing board member at Union Investment Asset Management Holding, effective from 30 November, the group announced on 12 November. Köhne was chief financial officer since 2003.In the interim until a successor can be appointed, the responsibilities of the outgoing man will be distributed among other managing board members.

The British firm F&C Investments on 11 November announced plans to launch a new fund for its multi-asset class targeted risk fund, which already includes four products. The F&C MM Lifestyle Foundation Fund will be the least risky of the range, with an allocation to cash/fixed income of 64.3%, a proportion of equities of 27.7%, and a proportion of real estate of 8%. Each fund invests in a basket of 35 to 40 funds or instruments, and the range currently weighs about GBP435m.

M&G Investments is planning to launch a new income fund as an addition to its multi-asset class range, Citywire reports. The fund, M&G Income Allocation fund, is still pending permission from the authorities. It will be managed by Steven Andrew.

The asset management unit at UniCredit, housed at Pioneer, recorded net inflows of EUR7.7bn in the first nine months of the year. Captive and non-captive clients both contributed to inflows, the Italian bank says. As of the end of September, assets under management totalled USD168.9bn, up 7% since the beginning of the year (+EUR11bn), also due to positive currency effects (+EUR3.3bn).

finews reports that Crédit Agricole Switzerland has recruited Patrick Ramsey, who will be head of the new Swiss private banking division as well as for Abu Dhabi, Beirut, Dubai, Hong Kong and Singapore, as its new head of the private clients division. He will report to Hervé Catala, CEO of Crédit Agricole Switzerland.Ramsey was CEO of Barclays Bank (Switzerland), head of wealth management Switzerland and country manager at Barclays Group for Switzerland. Before that, he was CEO of Merrill Lynch for Switzerland.Crédit Agricole Suisse has also recruited Hans Diederen as director of private banking for Asia, who will report to Ramsey, along with Youssef Dib, who has been appointed as head of ultra-high net worth investors (UHNWI). Diederen was previously at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, while for his part, Dib was global coordinator at BNP Paribas Private Banking.

Funds on sale in Sweden in October recorded net inflows of SEK4.1bn (EUR0.46bn), after SEK1.3bn (EUR0.15bn) in September, according to the most recent statistics from the Swedish fund association Fondbolagens Förening. Inflows were driven by balanced funds, which totalled SEK3.9bn (EUR0.44bn). Equity funds, for their part, took in SEK1.3bn (EUR0.15bn), due to Swedish equity funds and European equity funds. Money market funds, however, saw recemptions of SEK1.6bn. Year to date, funds on sale in Sweden have recorded net inflows of SEK62.8bn (EUR7bn), due to balanced and equity funds. As of the end of October, assets in funds on sale in Sweden totalled SEK2.389trn (nearly EUR270bn), about 55% of which is in equity funds.

Lyxor has launched the Lyxor UCITS ETF CSI 300 A Shares ETF in Sweden, Fondbranschen reports. The fund charges fees of 0.40%.

The alternative investment management association (AIMA) has announced the appointment of Jack Inglis as head of the professional association, according to a statement released on 11 November.Inglis, who is expected to begin in his duties in early 2014, was previously head of distribution for prime services and a member of the global executive board for prime services at Barclays.Inglis will succeed Andrew Baker, who had been head of the association since the beginning of 2009.

Investors have regained confidence in the global economic outlook following resolution of the U.S. debt crisis, according to the BofA Merrill Lynch Fund Manager Survey, carried out between 1 and 7 November, of a sample of panelists with USD599bn in assets under management. With political paralysis in Washington overcome, a net 67 percent of respondents now expect the world’s economy to strengthen over the next 12 months – up a notable 13 percentage points from October. In an important new question for the survey, investors were asked when the U.S. Federal Reserve will begin “tapering” its bond purchases – a signal that the central bank views economic conditions as robust enough to lessen its support. Forty-eight percent see this happening next March. Eighteen percent expect it in the second quarter of 2014.Investors increased their equity allocations slightly during the month to a net 52 percent overweight, while also upping their underweight in bonds. Their biggest shift was into global emerging markets equities, where they returned to a net overweight, while strong overweights in eurozone and Japanese stocks were moderated slightly. Strikingly, a small net majority of asset allocators now view equities as overvalued. This marked the first such reading on this measure since March 2004, but regionally, Europe is still considerably undervalued compared to the U.S. Over the month, fund managers also shifted their preferences strongly between global emerging markets. Reflecting the restoration of a potential hard landing in China as the greatest tail risk globally, emerging markets specialists scaled back their overweight in the country substantially to a net 11 percent, down 45 percentage points. China replaced Russia as their top pick among the BRIC markets on a 12-month basis, however.

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has published a statement on practices governed by the Takeover Bid Directive (TBD), focused on shareholder cooperation issues relating to acting in concert and the appointment of board members. The statement contains a White List of activities that shareholders can cooperate on without the presumption of acting in concert.The statement is in response to a request by the European Commission for clarity on these issues.

KBL European Private Bankers (KBL epb) announced today the appointment of Cédric Lebegge as General Manager, Project Management Office, based in Luxembourg. In this newly created role, Lebegge will lead the coordination, monitoring and support of large-scale group projects.This appointment comes at a time when KBL epb is focused on realizing its vision to become a top 20 European private banking group by 2015. To achieve this ambitious goal, the group is currently identifying inorganic growth opportunities – including through potential acquisitions in its core markets.Simultaneously, KBL epb has launched a group-wide Transformation Programme, a series of 14 key initiatives aimed at further professionalizing its approach to clients, delivering greater value and contributing to bottom-line results.As head of the Project Management Office, Lebegge and his team will play a steering role in both of these areas, among others, ensuring the long-term success of such projects across the group’s nine-country European footprint.Earlier, Lebegge served as a Brussels-based Partner in the Financial Services Practice at Bain & Company, a global business consultancy. During his 15 years of service there, he led a range of large-scale transformation and integration programmes for leading banks in Europe and Latin America, working from the firm’s Amsterdam, Kiev, Paris and Sao Paulo offices.

finews rapporte que Crédit Agricole Suisse a recruté comme nouveau responsable de la division clients privés Patrick Ramsey, qui sera la tête de l'équipe banque privée pour la Suisse Abou Dhabi, Beyrouth, Dubaï, Hong Kong et Singapour. Il sera subordonné à Hervé Catala, CEO de Crédit Agricole Suisse.Jusqu'à présent, Patrick Ramsey était directeur général de Barclays Bank (Suisse), head of wealth management Switzerland et country managers de Barclays Group pour la Suisse. Il avait auparavant été CEO de Merrill Lynch pour la Suisse.D’autre part, Crédit Agricole Suisse a embauché Hans Diederen comme directeur de la banque privée pour l’Asie, sous les ordres de Patrick Ramsey, tandis que Youssef Dib a été nommé responsable des particuliers très haut de gamme (UHNWI). Hans Diederen était aupravant chez Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Youssef Dib étant pour sa part, global coordinator chez BNP Paribas Private Banking.

Le pôle gestion d’actifs d’UniCredit, logé dans Pioneer, a enregistré sur les neuf premiers mois de l’année des souscriptions nettes de 7,7 milliards d’euros. La clientèle captive et non captive ont toutes les deux contribué à la collecte, précise la banque italienne.A fin septembre, les encours sous gestion sont ainsi ressortis à 168,9 milliards d’euros, en hausse de 7 % depuis le début de l’année (+11 milliards d’euros) grâce également à un effet marché et change positif (+3,3 milliards d’euros).

Ulrich Köhne a décidé «pour motifs personnels» de démissionner de son poste de membre du directoire d’Union Investment Asset Management Holding avec effet au 30 novembre, annonce le groupe le 12 novembre. Ulrich Köhne était directeur financier depuis 2003.Jusqu'à la nomination d’un successeur, l’intérim des fonctions du partant sera réparti entre les autres membres du directoire.