L’hypothèse croissante d’un rééchelonnement de la dette de la Grèce a amené hier S&P à baisser les notes du pays de «BB-» à «B». D’après ING, une extension de 3 ans des maturités, sans décote, permettrait à Athènes de diminuer ses besoins de 20 à 30 milliards d’euros par an.

Une extension de 3 ans des maturités, sans décote, permettrait à Athènes de diminuer ses besoins de 20 à 30 milliards d'euros

Elles semblent légèrement surévaluées, mais l'écart par rapport à leur tendance de long terme est modeste

Directrice générale de Middlenext, association d’entreprises moyennes, Caroline Weber milite dans un entretien accordé au quotidien pour un retour des interlocuteurs de la Bourse de Paris dans chacune des huit grandes villes françaises. Cela afin de «réactiver l’écosystème boursier ». La Bourse n’est à ses yeux «pas qu’un outil informatique, contrairement à ce que certains pourraient croire».

Une enveloppe de 1,5 milliard d’euros sera allouée au Fonds stratégique d’investissement (FSI) à partir du 1er juillet sous la forme d’un prêt à long terme, a déclaré lundi Christine Lagarde, qui a fait cette annonce en marge d’une visite au siège du groupe CGG Veritas, spécialiste des services et équipements géophysiques pour l’industrie pétrolière, aux Ulis. En 2010, Le FSI a investi au total 2,4 milliards d’euros dans des entreprises françaises comme STMicroelectronics, Vallourec, CGG Veritas ou Gemalto.

La Banque de France prévoit une croissance de 0,5% au deuxième trimestre, au vu de l'évolution de l’activité dont fait état son enquête de conjoncture d’avril publiée lundi. Il s’agit de la première estimation de la BdF pour la croissance du produit intérieur brut de la période avril-juin. Le chiffre du premier trimestre sera annoncé par l’Insee vendredi. La prévision de la BdF est de 0,7% pour les trois premiers mois de l’année alors que l’Insee s’attend à +0,6% avant un ralentissement au deuxième trimestre à +0,4%. L’enquête de conjoncture de la Banque de France fait état d’une progression modérée de l’activité dans l’industrie en avril, la croissance observée dans l’agroalimentaire et les autres produits industriels compensant en partie une nouvelle baisse de la production automobile et d'équipements. Dans les services, la croissance de l’activité s’est poursuivie à un rythme soutenu, sous l’impulsion des transports et des services informatiques mais avec un ralentissement du travail temporaire. L’indicateur du climat des affaires dans l’industrie a reculé de 3 points à 107 alors que dans les services il a baissé d’un point à 102.

Le moral des investisseurs de la zone euro a de nouveau baissé en mai, avec un indice ressortant à 10,9, après 14,2 en avril et 17,1 en mars, montre lundi l’enquête mensuelle du cabinet d'études Sentix. Le sous-indice des conditions actuelles est tombé de 25,5 en avril à 23,75 en mai, et celui des anticipations a plongé de 3,5 à -1,25. C’est la première fois que cette composante bascule en territoire négatif depuis juillet 2010.

La Grèce veut une baisse des taux d’intérêt attachés à l’aide financière que le pays reçoit de l’Union européenne et du Fonds monétaire international (FMI), rapporte lundi Die Welt, citant des sources proches des négociations. Le quotidien allemand rapporte également que le gouvernement grec cherche à assouplir les mesures d’austérité qu’il est sommé de prendre en échange de l’octroi du plan de sauvetage de 110 milliards d’euros.

La Commission européenne espère que la décision de baisser le taux d’intérêt des prêts consentis à l’Irlande dans le cadre du plan d’aide internationale pourra être prise dans les semaines à venir, a dit un porte-parole de l’exécutif européen. «La Commission est clairement favorable à une baisse des taux», a-t-il déclaré, ajoutant que Bruxelles était opposé à toute restructuration de la dette irlandaise.

La Mutuelle MAE (Mutuelle Accidents Elèves) a choisi de confier un mandat de gestion diversifié à EGAMO. La signature du mandat a eu lieu le 2 mai 2011 dans les locaux d’EGAMO en présence d’Edgard Mathias (président de la Mutuelle MAE) et de Fabrice Henry (président d’EGAMO). Créée en 1932 par des enseignants, la Mutuelle MAE s’est imposée comme le spécialiste de la protection de l’enfant. Elle propose de nombreux contrats d’assurances mutualistes adaptées aux besoins des enfants et de leurs parents. De l’assurance des tout petits jusqu’aux protections pour les étudiants, des contrats individuels et habitation pour les jeunes actifs jusqu'à l’assurance familiale, la Mutuelle MAE est reconnue comme leader de l’assurance scolaire et extrascolaire depuis près de 80 ans. L’offre de gestion personnalisée d’EGAMO, assortie d’un service d’accompagnement global sur l’ensemble des problématiques de ses clients mutualistes, lui ont permis d'être sélectionnée par la Mutuelle MAE pour la gestion de ses placements financiers.

Two researchers in Geneva has studied 10,000 US and European hedge funds. Le Temps reports that they found that the number of managers capable of beating the market is much higher than for traditional funds, but that they are still in the minority. And the percentage of managers who can do so varies significantly depending on the strategies used, generally ranging from 0% to 20%, compared with 10% for traditional management, after fees. Once performance commissions are taken into account, the percentage falls to 0.6%.

In first quarter, investors allocated more than USD3.6bn to hedge funds dedicated to Asia, Asian Investor reports. In addition to that, market effects contributed to a net increase in assets of USD4.6bn, bringing total assets under management to USD88.1bn. The market share for hedge funds dedicated to Asia and based in China and Hong Kong now exceeds those in the United States, with a 26.29% market share for the former, compared with less than 25% for the latter.

Björn Robens, the new CEO, has told Handelsblatt that BHF-Bank has attracted EUR500m since the beginning of this year, despite uncertainty about its future (Deutsche Bank has recently called off plans to sell the firm to LGT). The activity has remained stable, and there have been no departures of directors from the private bank and asset management, Robens says.

Clive Capital, the world’s largest commodity hedge fund which manages USD5bn, has lost more than USD400m as a result of the collapse in the price of oil last week, according to the Financial Times. Clive said it was down 8.9 per cent last week. The management of the firm said it was at a loss to explain what had caused crude oil markets to be “annihilated”.

As an addition to its range of funds dedicated to emerging markets, Martin Currie is planning to launch a fund dedicated to India, FundWeb reports. The Indian market is highly attractive for a stock-picking approach, John Pickard, an investment head at Martin Currie, says, and the young population in the country means that strong increases in consumer spending are to be expected.

At the end of first quarter, the number of new Riester state-subsidized unit-linked retirement savings policies totalled nearly 2.85 million, according to the BVI association of German management firms. In twelve months, assets have increased from EUR5.6bn to EUR7.6bn.

EFAMA will this Monday unveil a code for good governance in the asset management industry, Financial Times Fund Management reports. The document will include recommendations to stimulate engagement practices.

The management firm GAM announced on Friday, 6 May that the Swiss Federal financial market surveillance authority (FINMA) has authorised its complete UCITS III product range for sale to Swiss investors. Three equities funds focused on the themes of technology, sustainable development and inflation will now be released. The new funds – GAM Star Global Equity Inflation Focus (ISIN: IE00B4M7MR78), GAM Star Geo (ISIN: IE00B5WLH375), and GAM Star Technology (ISIN: IE00B5THWW23) – were described by Newsmanagers when they received licenses from the German regulator (see Newsmanagers of 14/03/2011).

Financial News reports that Tim Russell has left his job as director for pan-European equities at Cazenove Capital Management. As a result, Chris Rice will replace him, while Steve Cordell will manage the British long/short products at the asset management firm.

Baring Asset Management has announced the recruitment of Steven Carter, formerly of Aberdeen Asset Management, as head of data management, and Hohn Poole as head of fund services. The two new recruits will be based in London.

The German federal financial services supervisory authority (BaFin) has issued a license to Feri EuroRating Services as a European rating agency. Feri says that it is one of only three ratings agencies in Europe which have received the license so far, in keeping with European Community directives (the other ones are the Japan Credit Rating Agency, licensed by the French watchdog, AMF, and Euler Hermes, licensed by the BaFin). The registration is valid for the entire European Union, for credit ratings, a sector in which Feri has been providing country ratings of sovereign debt for over 20 years. The European directive for the first time makes rating agencies subject to state supervision. In addition to its headquarters in Bad Homburg in Germany, Feri EuroRatings has offices in London, Paris and New York.

According to the most recent monthly estimates by BNY Mellon Asset Management, the average coverage rate for corporate pension funds was up 0.8% in April, at 89.2%. This is the eighth consecutive month of improvement, BNY Mellon AM reports. Since the beginning of the year, the coverage rate has risen 4.9 percentage points. In April, the US stock markets posted a 2.6% increase, while pension fund liabilities increased by only 1.8%.

Fidelity would like to increase the fees charged to subscribers to its oldest fund, Mutual Find Wire reports. The Fidelity Fund, launched in April 1930, has USD6.1bn in assets. Currently, the fund charges 61 basis points, of which 35 basis points go to management. The US management firm would like to increase the management fees to 56 basis points, and add a performance fee (+/- 21 basis points, depending on outperformance or underperformance compared with the S&P 500).

The US management firm Glboal X Funds has launched what it says is the first ETF in the world of Mexican small caps, entitled Global X Mexico Small-Cap ETF.

With a team of four founding partners, Jacques Lucas, chairman, Philippe de Gouville, head of management, Jean-Guillaume Grebet, head of research, and Thomas Dubreuil, head of sales, the alternative management firm Exqim develops arbitrage strategies based on a quantitative approach, which is systematic and completely automated. The firm has recently launched its first fund, the Exqim Blue Fund.

At a presentation in Paris on 5 May, Avi Lavi, CIO for European value equities at AllianceBernstein, sought to demonstrate to his audience that the time is now favourable for a value approach, following the market transformations of the past decade, particularly as, following the crisis, investors are once again hungry for equities, particularly “value” style equities, which are as inexpensive as in the late 1970s, but with much lower interest rates. They often offer dividend yields higher than those of bonds from the same issuer, while many groups are virtually swimming in liquidity, which leaves a margin to be redistributed to shareholders. AllianceBernstein is so convinced of the correctness of its approach, that it has recently entered the amLeague championship (see Newsmanagers of 14 January) to gain visibility among institutional investors, Olivier Herson, vice president for France, adds. The stock-picking process (bottom-up) undertaken by AllianceBernstein managers involves identifying blind spots and taking advantage of behavioural biases, and then undertaking further management, with about 75% active bets for the European Strategic value of, with EUR113m in assets, and the Eurozone Strategic Value fund, with EUR45m. They are currently betting on special situations (restructuring, mergers, spin-offs), the Euro zone crisis, including the banking sector, and on sustainable recovery, with major industrial sector businesses which have been unjustly undervalued. In terms of the price to book ratio (P/B), at 1.2 for the European Value, and multiples (P/E), at 9 times, the portfolio of the European Value fund is much «cheaper» than the market generally. In addition, Lavi claims, the 17 products of the value range (a strategy which represents a total of EUR81bn) all have earned positive annualised returns since their inception. The 10 value portfolios domiciled in Luxembourg have about EUR2bn in assets. The Paris office has about EUR2.5bn in assets, of which about 60-70% is in credit. The equities products which have been most popular so far have been the Asia, Japan and United States funds. Herson’s objective is now to build up the European value equities product range, which represents only about EUR70m in mandates, and about EUR90m in funds.

Pierre Galitzine has joined Swan Capital Management as head of asset allocation, as an addition to the asset management team specialised in stock-picking. Alitzine, 57, has been specialised in macroeconomic analysis for 30 years, and has worked with the group Cecogest, and with Marc de Scivitaux at Cahiers verts de l’économie, a statement says. Galitzine has also had a career as a portfolio manager, and helped to found the asset management firm Optigestion.

The BlackRock Solutions unit at BlackRock has become an indispensable actor for the US government, which is seeking to unload distressed assets it accumulated during the financial crisis, the Wall Street Journal reports. For example, on Wednesday, the entity helped the Federal Reserve to auction off subprime mortgages acquired from AIG in 2008. In total, BlackRock Solutions has helped the Fed to sell securities with a face value of over USD5.38bn.

Oddo Asset Management is entering Italy, Plus 24, the money supplement of Il Sole – 24 Ore reports. The French asset management firm has licensed the Avenir Europe fund and opened a representative office in the country. For now, Oddo is targeting the institutional market. Next year, the retail market will also be targeted.

A la fin du premier trimestre, le nombre de nouveaux contrats d'épargne-retraite Riester (subventionnés) sous forme de parts de fonds d’investissement atteint près de 2,85 millions d’unités, selon l’association allemande BVI des sociétés de gestion. Sur douze mois, l’encours total est passé de 5,6 milliards d’euros à 7,6 milliards.