According to BlackRock, as of the end of May, assets in ETF funds domiciled in Europe were down by USD10bn, or 3%, in one month, to USD318.2bn, which remains 12% higher than their levels as of the end of December.In the first five months of the year, the number of ETF funds increased 7.6%, to 1.154 funds (listed 3,954 times), with 108 new funds launched, seven removed from trading, and 19 mergers.Net subscriptions in January-May totalled USD15.3bn, of which USD7.8bn went to iShares, and USD2.8bn to UBS Global Asset Management, with these two actors accounting for 75.2% of total net inflows. Lyxor Asset Management (Société Générale), for its part, underwent the largest net outflows, totalling USD2.1bn, In the month of May alone, net subscriptions totalled USD2.2bn, with iShares posting net subscriptions of USD3.8bn, and Amundi ETF posting net subscriptions of USD0.4bn, while ETFlab Investment (Deka) underwent net outflows of USD1.5bn.In terms of assets, iShares remains the largest provider, with 167 ETF funds and USD115bn in assets (a market share of 36.1%). It is followed by Lyxor, with 161 products and assets of USD53.7bn (a market share of 16.9%), and db x-trackers (Deutsche Bank), whose product range includes 158 ETFs and assets of USD51.3bn, for a market share of 16.1%.

The Australian bank Macquarie and a branch of the China – Everbright financial group have created an investment fund with USD729m in assets, to profit from increasing strain in the financing of infrastructure projects in Greater China, the Financial Times reports. The Macquarie Everbright Greater China Infrastructure Fund will focus on about 150 infrastructure projects, and aims to be in pole position for potential sales of government holdings in those assets.

Corinne Ng, head of trading, investment and research for European and North American real estate companies at Aims Snowden Global Property Securities, has been recruited as an analyst for the North American REIT (Real Estate Investment Trust) market at Aviva Investors. Ng will be based in New York, and will report to Sherry Rexroad, senior portfolio manager for the North American REIT market, and will work in close collaboration with the rest of the Global REIT team in London, Singapore and Australia.The Global REIT team at Aviva Investors includes 11 investment professionals based in the United States, Singapore, the United Kingdom and Australia. It is led by Paul van de Vaart, and manages USD915m in assets.

BlackRock has announced the appointment of Terence Keeley as managing director and head of its Official Institutions division, which provides services to institutional investors worldwide. It is a newly-created position. Keeley will be based in New York. Before joining BlackRock, Keeley was director of the consultant Sovereign Trends.

Some hedge funds, including Children’s Investment Fund Management, or TCI (Chris Cooper-Hohn, USD9.5bn), Tiger Global Management (Chase Coleman), and H Partners Management (Rehan Jaffer, USD1bn) have earned total returns since the beginning of the year of 15% to 22%, while the average hedge fund has made only 1%, and equities have made 5%, the Wall Street Journal reports. The money is coming in due to bets on TV networks (CBS, Viacom, Walt Disney, Liberty, Cablevision), and other media (LinkedIn, Netflix), and on amusement parks (Six Flags Entertainment).

Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management has recruited Thomas Vlieghe as a diversified manager for its asset allocation team in Paris. The team, led by Françoise Rochette, includes eight managers. “The recruitment is a part of Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management’s initiative to add to its asset allocation team, in response to growth in assets, which as of the end of April totalled EUR2.7bn,” a statement explains. Vlieghe, 33, had worked for Allianz Global Investors since 2005. For 6 years, he served as open-ended diversified fund and dedicated mandate manager for institutional clients, businesses, and retirement planning organisms.

As of 31 May, assets at Legg Mason Inc totalled USD670.9bn, compared with USD672bn as of the end of April, and USD677.6bn as of the end of March. This total is nonetheless higher than USD671.8bn as of 31 December 2010.Long-term assets were down for the month to USD552.7bn, compared with USD556.2bn as of the end of April, but assets in money market funds were up by USD2.4bn, to USD118.2bn.

The wealth of the 611,000 Italian families with assets of over EUR500,000 as of 2010 totalled EUR896bn, according to Il Sole – 24 Ore. The percentage of these portfolios invested in equities is only 11.3%, compared with a European average of 14%. These high net worth investors place most of their assets in bonds, at 48%, more than double the European average. A growing number of investors are placing their assets with private bankers. The sector manages 47% of assets, a 6.8% increase over 2010.

A survey by the Financial Services Authority of wealth managers based in the United Kingdom has shown that about 80% of retail clients had been sold a product which was not suitable for them, the Financial Times reports. Many advisors recommended products which involved more risk than was appropriate to the client’s situation. Others had information about clients which was so incomplete or outdated that it was impossible to say whether the advice was appropriate.

Henderson Global Investors has announced that some of its funds have recently acquired 0.4 million shares in Liontrust Asset Management, putting the management firm’s total stake in its competitor at just above 3.92 million shares, or 11.1% of capital.

At the AGM of Inverco, the Spanish association of management firms, on 14 June, Miguel Angel Rodriguez of Ahorro Corporación and Fermín Alvarez of Fonditel Pension, were elected as chairman of the group of collective investment organisms and chairman of the pension fund group, respectively, replacing Carlos Pérez Parada (Barclays Wealth Managers España) and David Carrasco (BBVA Pensiones).The AGM also voted to modify the rules relating to associate members joining the association. An initial list of 25 members in this category has been approved, which includes, among others, Accenture, BNP Paribas Securities, Bolsas y Mercados Españoles (BME), Deloitte, KPMG, Garrigues, Linklaters, Moody’s, Morningstar, PwC, S&P and VDOS Stochastics.

Stewart Cowley, head of fixed income at Old Mutual Asset Managers, is recommending avoiding the US dollar. At a conference organised by Expert Investor last week, Cowley claimed that it is time to start preparing for a fall in the value of the US currency, as the country is very far from having resolved its deficit problems. “The Fed looks like a leveraged hedge fund,” he says. However, although all eyes are currently on Greece, Cowley considers that the European restructuring plan is “credible.” Cowley had previously been avoiding the euro, but now he is gradually returning to the European currency. The head of fixed income at OMAM, who is also avoiding the Japanese yen, prefers commodity currencies, such as the Australian dollar, the Canadian dollar, and the South African rand. Cowley also states that he is avoiding government bonds, leaning toward a negative duration, and preferring businesses with low gearing and unique product positioning.

Investors have scaled back risk taking in the past month, reducing exposure to equities and commodities while upping allocations to cash and bonds, according to the BofA Merrill Lynch Survey of Fund Managers for June, completed between June 3 and June 9 and covering 282 managers, with assets under management totalling USD828bn. Asset allocators have been adjusting portfolios in the face of falling world markets, significantly reducing their holdings in equities. The net percentage overweight equities fell to 27 percent from 41 percent in May, with Europe leading the way. The proportion of investors underweight eurozone equities rose to a net 15 percent from a net 1 percent. The proportion of investors overweight commodities fell to a net 6 percent from a net 12 percent. A net 18 percent of asset allocators are now overweight cash. This represents the highest cash overweight level since June 2010 and a sharp move upwards from last month’s reading of a net 6 percent. Bonds, unloved throughout much of the past two years, have enjoyed a recovery during the past two months. A net 35 percent of asset allocators are underweight bonds, compared with a net 58 percent in April and 44 percent in May. Behind the shifts in allocations are concerns about sovereign debt funding in Europe, which investors have named as the biggest tail risk in this month’s survey. Investors have also lowered expectations of strong growth in global profits, but broad sentiment towards the global economy has stabilized. While economic optimism is down, investors are not pessimistic enough to be calling for a third round of quantitative easing (QE3). Investors are struggling to form a clear and consistent view towards emerging markets. While optimism towards emerging market equities as a whole is on the up, concerns over the direction of China’s economy continue to grow. Allocation to emerging market equities fell in June, with a net 23 percent of asset allocators overweight the region, down from a net 29 percent in May. Looking ahead, however, emerging markets could become the preferred destination for investment once again.

As of the end of May, assets under management in ETFs worldwide totalled USD1.4466trn, 1.6% lower than at the end of April (USD1.4698trn), but 10.3% higher than at the end of December (USD1.3113trn). By comparison, assets as of the end of May 2010 totalled USD1.0441trn, according to statistics from BlackRock.The US asset management firm counted a total of 2,747 ETF funds as of the end of last month, listed 6,079 times on 49 stock markets, from 142 providers. Since the beginning of 2011, the number of ETF funds has increased by 11.7%, with 313 fund launches, 7 funds removed from trading, and 19 mergers. There are currently plans to launch 1,022 new ETF funds.The top three providers remain unchanged: iShares (BlackRock) remains the largest by far, with 470 ETF funds and USD628.5bn in assets, followed by State Street Global Advisors (SSgA, 134 products and USD203.4bn), and Vanguard (69 funds and Usd177.6bn). These three firms represent a market share of 69.8%, with 43.5% for iShares, 14.1% for SSgA, and 12.3% for Vanguard. The next two providers in the rankings are Lyxor Asset Management (Société Générale) and db x-trackers (Deutsche Bank), with respective market share of 3.8% and 3.6%, corresponding to USD54.5bn and USD52.6bn.

PerTrac, a provider of software and services for the asset management and hedge fund sectors, is seeking to develop its presence serving family offices. “Europe and Asia are two priority growth areas for us. In Europe, we would like to develop our activities serving family offices in particular,” Lisa Corvese, managing director in charge of international strategy sunce last month, told Newsmanagers on 14 June on a visit to Paris.PerTrac, which has already developed a number of partnerships, would like to continue that course in the coming years, with the immediate emphasis on the development of data management tools, particularly for UCITS vehicles. PerTrac is also planning to provide quarterly data on developments in the hedge fund sector on a quarterly basis, starting this autumn.Corvese says that renewed interest in hedge funds on the part of investors starting last year (see Newsmanagers of 27 April 2011) will continue this year. “In the next two years, that trend will continue, and hedge funds will become mainstream,” Corvese says, predicting that there will be a major boom in ultra-high net worth (UHNW) clients.Institutional investors such as pension funds are also showing an increasing interest in alternative management, but are limited by internal rules, which little time will be invested in developing. However, managed accounts platforms offer a good compromise from this point of view, in terms of transparency and risk surveillance as well as cost.

The British asset management firm M&G Investments is planning to merge two income funds dedicated to UK equities, the M&G Income Fund, with assets under management of slightly over GBP200m, and the M&G Dividend fund (GBP521m).Pending the approval of shareholders, the smaller of the two funds will be merged into the larger one in mid-August.Alex Odd, who has managed the two funds since July 2010, applies the same investment approach to the two vehicles. Hence the idea of merging the two portfolios, whose structures have recently become increasingly similar.

Fund Strategy reports that Henderson is to merge three Gartmore multi-manager funds on August 12, 201. The Gartmore Active Fund will be merged into the Henderson Active Fund, while the Balanced fund will be merged into the Henderson Managed Fund, and the Multi-Manager Cautious Fund will be merged into the Multi-Manager Income and Growth Fund.

The alternative management firm Polar Capital has reported an increase of 11% in its assets under management in the past two months, to USD4.3bn, the news agency Reuters reports. Polar Capital had already reported a 53% increase in its assets under management as of 31 March 2011, at USD3.87bn.Though long-only funds have posted net subscriptions for the year to 31 March of USD950m, for a total of USD3.1bn, hedge funds have posted an outflow of USD229m for the year to 31 March, to USD771m, and this trend is continuing, Polar Capital admits, though it says it would like to increase the weight of this unit, which currently represents about 15% of total assets.

Bank Julius Baer, which aims to make Asia its second home market, has announced that it continues to strengthen its Investment Solutions Group (ISG) in Asia with the appointments of Mark Matthews as head research, Asia and Dr Lee Boon Keng as sole head investment solutions group, Singapore. Reporting to Dr Lee, Mark, who is a specialist with more than 18 years experience in financial and investment sector, will be based in Singapore with a regional mandate.

The Luxembourg investment fund association (ALFI) has claimed in a statement released on 14 June that the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) in the version passed by the US government in March 2010, which is set to come into force on 1 January 2013, may drive European management firms into a long and costly series of adaptations, whose costs would be paid by clients (experts estimate a cose of USD40 per investor), at a time when US investors are hardly invested in European funds at all. Charles Muller, deputy director of ALFI, says that the association does not oppose FATCA, but that some concessions and a longer transition period should be allowed, while retaining the objective of the bill, namely to combat tax evasion in the United States. The law affects all funds which invest in the US market: providers of financial services, investment funds, management firms and foreign banks are required in their annual reports to declare US taxpayers’ earnings to the US authorities, or to pay the US tax authorities a withholding tax of 30% on gross revenues, dividends and interest.

Le britannique M&G Investments envisage de fusionner deux fonds de revenus dédiés aux actions britanniques, le M&G Income fund dont les actifs sous gestion s'élèvent à un peu plus de 200 millions de livres, et le M&G Dividend fund qui affiche un encours de 521 millions de livres.Sous réserve de l’accord des actionnaires, le plus petit des deux fonds sera intégré dans le second à la mi-août. Alex Odd, qui gère les deux fonds depuis juillet 2010, applique la même approche d’investissement aux deux véhicules. D’où l’idée de rapprocher les deux portefeuilles dont les structures sont de plus en plus similaires ces temps derniers.

La société de gestion alternative Polar Capital a fait état pour les deux derniers mois d’une progression de 11% de ses actifs sous gestion à 4,3 milliards de dollars, rapporte l’agence Reuters. Déjà pour l’exercice au 31 mars 2011, Polar Capital avait fait état d’un bond de 53% de ses actifs sous gestion, à 3,87 milliards de dollars.Alors que les fonds long only ont enregistré durant l’année au 31 mars dernier des souscriptions nettes pour un montant de quelque 950 millions de dollars à 3,1 milliards de dollars, les hedge funds ont subi une décollecte de 229 millions durant l’année au 31 mars à 771 millions de dollars. Cette tendance est encore à l'œuvre, reconnaît Polar Capital qui souhaite toutefois redonner plus de poids à ce pôle qui représente désormais seulement 15% environ du total des actifs.

Henderson Global Investors a indiqué que certains de ses fonds ont récemment acquis 0,4 million d’actions de Liontrust Asset Management, si bien qu’au total le gestionnaire détient plus de 3,92 millions de titres de son concurrent, ce qui représente une participation de 11,1 %.

Selon Fund Strategy, Henderson envisage de fusionner trois fonds de multigestion de Gartmore le 12 août prochain. Le Gartmore Active Fund sera fusionné avec le Henderson Active Fund, le Balanced sera fusionné avec le Henderson Managed Fund et le Multi-Manager Cautious Fund sera fusionné avec le Multi-manager Income et Growth Fund.

Le suisse Lombard Odier est en train de renforcer ses forces de vente à destination de la clientèle institutionnelle en Asie. Par ailleurs, il envisage de constituer une équipe d’experts sur les actions long/short, le crédit et les devises et de recruter un responsable régional de l’investissement, rapporte Asian Investor.Le groupe, qui a nommé en mars dernier son premier responsable Asie en la personne de Vincent Duhamel, gère quelque 158 milliards de dollars, dont 7 milliards (4,4%) issus de la clientèle asiatique. Lombard Odier souhaite doubler les actifs sous gestion d’origine asiatique dans les cinq prochaines années.

Julius Baer, qui veut faire de l’Asie son deuxième marché domestique, a annoncé le 14 juin un renforcement de son Investment Solutions Group (ISG) dans la région. Mark Matthews a été nommé Head Research, Asie, et Lee Boon Keng Head Investment Solutions Group, Singapour. Mark Matthews, directement rattaché à Lee Boon Keng, jouit de plus de 18 ans d’expérience dans la finance et le secteur de la banque d’investissement.

Les montants à engager en cas de débouclage des CDS sur la Grèce sont sans commune mesure avec le poids de la dette réelle

La participation des investisseurs privés a cristallisé les divergences entre partenaires européens

La Bourse de Zurich mène selon le quotidien une enquête relative à des soupçons de délit d’initié au sujet de l’annonce en avril du rachat pour 21 milliards de dollars de Synthes par Johnson & Johnson. Il s’agirait d’expliquer une «activité inhabituelle de trading» avant cette annonce. Un gage de la vigilance des autorités européennes selon le quotidien.

Le quotidien croit savoir que l’autorité américaine des marchés mène une enquête concernant les conditions de commercialisation par la banque américaine d’une titrisation liée à l’immobilier d’un montant de 1,5 milliard de dollars pour le compte du fonds alternatif Magnetar. La SEC s’interroge notamment sur la pertinence de la valorisation des actifs.