Les hedge funds focalisés sur l’Asie ont récupéré tous les actifs perdus après les mauvaises performances de l’an dernier même si le secteur a sous-performé les marchés locaux au premier trimestre 2012, selon les statistiques de Hedge Fund Research citées par le Financial Times. Les encours ont atteint 86,7 milliards de dollars fin mars contre 83,4 milliards fin 2010. La Chine domine le secteur local et désormais 30 % des hedge funds mondiaux en nombre sont désormais basés dans le pays (Hong Kong compris), juste derrière les Etats-Unis. Toutefois, la plupart des fonds asiatiques sont bien plus petits que ceux des Etats-Unis et ceux des autres pays et ils ne représentent que 4 % des 2.130 milliards de dollars d’encours du secteur.
Au 31 mars, l’encours de la division épargne long terme d’Old Mutal, qui comprend les actifs gérés par Skandia, ressortait à 116,1 milliards de livres, rapporte Fundweb. Les encours des fonds de droit britannique ont augmenté de 6 % sur fin décembre à 35,6 milliards de livres tandis que ceux des «platform funds» britanniques gonflaient de 8 % à 20,4 milliards.
Le Fortuny Valores Reales d’Espirito Santo Gestión a obtenu l’agrément de commercialisation en Espagne, rapporte Funds People. Ce produit est un fonds d’actions qui investit dans des sociétés du monde entier liées à l’extraction, la production, le développement ou la distribution de produits et/ou services liés aux matières premières ainsi qu’en instruments financiers sur indices de matières premières ou sur matières premières faisant l’objet de transactions sur un marché réglementé.L’indice de référence est le Reuters/Jefferies CRB.CaractéristiquesDénomination : Fortuny Valores RealesCommission de gestion : 1,35 %Commission de performance : 9 %Souscription minimale : 10 euros
Jamie Dimon, le PDG de JPMorgan, a dû expliquer en fin de semaine dernière comment sa banque a pu perdre 2 milliards de dollars dans des opérations de couverture sur le marché des CDS, tout en restant très flou sur la nature des positions prises, rapporte L’Agefi. Des pertes aussi énormes pour des positions censées en couvrir d’autres éveillent des soupçons sur la nature purement spéculative de l’activité. D’autant que la facture gonflera encore de «un milliard de dollars ou plus» d’ici à fin juin ou au troisième trimestre, précise le quotidien. Attendue au tournant par plusieurs hedge funds -BlueMountain et Blue Crest auraient gagné de l’argent dans l’affaire - la banque ne peut pas liquider d’un coup ses positions.
Edmond de Rothschild Capital Partners vient d’annoncer trois promotions au sein de ses équipes. Paul Barry est nommé directeur de Participations, Marie Londero est nommée chargée d’affaires et Jean-David Maillard est nommé secrétaire général adjoint. Paul Barry, 34 ans, a rejoint Edmond de Rothschild Capital Partners en 2009 comme directeur d’investissement. De son côté, Marie Londero, 26 ans, a commencé sa carrière chez Edmond de Rothschild Capital Partners en 2010 en tant qu’analyste. Enfin, Jean-David Maillard, 30 ans, a rejoint Edmond de Rothschild Capital Partners en 2008, en tant que chargé d’affaires Juridiques et Financières.
Natixis agissant pour compte propre, a déclaré avoir franchi en hausse, le 7 mai 2012, les seuils de 5% du capital et des droits de vote de la société Vivendi. Elle détient 65.020.613 actions représentant autant de droits de vote, soit 5,21% du capital et des droits de vote de cette société.Ce franchissement de seuils résulte d’une acquisition d’actions Vivendi sur le marché et hors marché.
Fidelity Investments a annoncé le lancement de ses deux premiers fonds de rendement à se focaliser sur les actions internationales (cela porte à 10 le nombre des fonds de rendement actions de la gamme Fidelity). Il s’agit du Fidelity Global Equity Income Fund qui s’adresse directement aux particuliers et du Fidelity Advisor Global Equity Income Fund accessible uniquement au travers de conseillers financiers. L’objectif de ces produits gérés par Ramona Persaud est de surperformer l’indice MSCI All Country World.La commission ds gestion est plafonnée à 1,20 % pour la classe de parts retail, à 1,20 % pour les parts institutionnelles et à 1,45%, 1,70 % et 2,20 % pour les parts «advisors» A, T et C, respectivement.
La société de gestion basée à New York Arden Asset Management va aider l’Etat du Massachusetts à transférer des centaines de millions de dollars dans les portefeuilles de gérants de hedge funds.Selon Reuters, Arden AM a remporté un mandat de gestionnaire de transition pour le compte du fonds de pension de l’Etat du Massachusetts, dont les actifs sous gestion s'élèvent à environ 50 milliards de dollars. Il s’agit de sortir des capitaux investis dans des fonds de fonds pour investir en direct dans une sélection de hedge funds. Le fonds de pension investit environ 10% de ses actifs dans des hedge funds.Les actifs sous gestion d’Arden AM s'élèvent à environ 6,5 milliards de dollars.
Des dirigeants de TCW, filiale de SocGen, ont entamé des discussions préliminaires avec leur maison mère en vue d’un rachat de la société, rapporte L’Agefi qui s’appuie sur une information de Reuters. Il n’y a pas de processus formel de cession et le rachat de TCW par ses dirigeants n’est qu’une des nombreuses options envisagées, a précisé l’une des sources. La Société Générale a démenti tout projet de cession.
Le fonds Skandia European Best Ideas Fund, un fonds de Skandia Investment Group regroupant les meilleures idées d’investissement de plusieurs gérants actions en Europe, a confié un mandat de 34 millions d’euros à Richard Plackett de BlackRock. Ce fonds de 340 millions d’euros, qui vient de fêter ses quatre ans, est géré par Lee Freeman Shor.
Le secteur des hedge funds a enregistré en mars une collecte nette de 2,3 milliards de dollars, contre 6,8 milliards de dollars en février, selon des statistiques communiquées par TrimTabs et BarclayHedge.Le premier trimestre s’est néanmoins terminé sur une décollecte de 3,2 milliards de dollars. La performance du trimestre s’est élevée à 5,6%, à comparer à un bond de 12% pour le S&P 500.Certaines stratégies continuent toutefois d’attirer les investisseurs, notamment les stratégies macro et fixed income qui affichent des collectes significatives sur les trois dernières années.
Les investisseurs confrontés à une volatilité persistante des marchés ont injecté davantage de capitaux dans les hedge funds au mois d’avril. Selon les estimations communiquées par l’administrateur de fonds GlobeOp, la collecte nette d’avril a représenté 1,24% des encours (environ 187 milliards de dollars) des fonds suivis par la société. Ce montant représente presque cinq fois la collecte du mois précédent qui s'était établie à 0,27% mais reste très en retrait par rapport aux flux positifs observés en mars (2,02%) et février (2,2%) ou il y a un an (2,41%).Par ailleurs, des statistiques communiquées par TrimTabs et BarclayHedge fixent la collecte nette de mars pour le secteur des hedge fund à 2,3 milliards de dollars, contre 6,8 milliards de dollars en février. Le premier trimestre s’est néanmoins terminé sur une décollecte de 3,2 milliards de dollars. Certaines stratégies continuent toutefois d’attirer les investisseurs, notamment les stratégies macro et fixed income qui affichent des collectes significatives sur les trois dernières années. Toujours selon TrimTabs et BarclayHedge, la performance du trimestre s’est élevée à 5,6%, à comparer à un bond de 12% pour le S&P 500.
Sergio Heuer, le président d’Olympia depuis environ un an, revient dans un entretien à Newsmanagers sur la fusion récente de la société qu’il dirige avec l’américain Kenmar. Selon lui, cela s’inscrit dans un mouvement nécessaire de concentration du secteur de la multigestion alternative, marqué d’ailleurs récemment par plusieurs opérations. Cette recomposition n’est pas encore terminée, selon Sergio Heuer, et Olympia Kenmar compte bien en être un acteur clé.
The financial ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) on 11 May announced that it is cutting its outlook for the debt rating of JPMorgan Chase, following an announcement by the US bank of a trading loss of USS2bn. Fitch, for its part, has lowered its rating for the US bank. Its long-term debt issuer rating has been lowered to A+ from AA- previously, and the agency has also lowered its solidity rating to A+ from AA-, with a negative outlook on both these ratings.
Ryo Ishiyama, who until the end of May is a member of the team at Deutsche Securities Inc, in October 2011 founded his own asset management firm in Tokyo, Steinberg Capital Co. He is planning to launch a CTA fund in July, which will use software solutions to invest worldwide in publicly-traded commodity futures, Handelsblatt reports, relaying Bloomberg.The fund will initially have JPY300m in assets (EUR2.9m), of which JPY200m will be contributed by Ishiyama, but the objective is to achieve JPY1bn in the space of one year, with annual returns of about 20%.
The hedge fund management firm Elliott Advisors is planning to require Greece either to repay EUR436m in debts maturing on 15 May, or to declare a default under international debt issuance standards, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports. In the former case, Elliott would win out. In the latter case, the asset management firm would seek to reclaim its money in the courts, as it has already done successfully in Peru and Panama in the past.
After 11 years at Fidelity International Germany, most recently as head of retail banks distribution, Alexander Koch is joining BlackRock, where he will be regional head of distribution of open-ended funds to banks, insurers and IFAs in Hesse, the Palatinate region, and Saarland.Koch replaces Meret Vetter, who will now be in charge of distribution to funds of funds, wealth managers, and family offices.
Deutsche Bank and the US firm Guggenheim Partners have failed to reach an agreement for an acquisition for a part of the asset management activities of the former. According to a statement released on 11 May, talks have essentially failed.Exclusive negotiations which began in November last year had dealt largely with the US portion of the asset management firm DWS, asset management activities dedicated to institutionals at DB Advisors, and the insurance firms (Deutsche Insurance Asset Management), These activities were not ultimately of interest to Guggenheim partners, who are reportedly interested only in the alternative management activities at RREEF, specialised in investments in real estate.
The directors of TCW, an affiliate of SocGen, have begun preliminary talks with their parent company over an acquisition of the firm, Agefi reports, based on reports in Reuters. There is no formal sale process, and an acquisition of TCW by its directors is only one of several possibilities under consideration, one source says. SocGen denies all reports of a planned sale.
The board of directors at Credit Suisse is seeking a new CEO to replace Brady Dougan, whose neck is on the chopping block following a slide in the company’s share price, the newspaper Der Sonntag reports. The newspaper reports, citing a top executive at the bank, “that the board of directors is urgently considering” the question of Dougan’s replacement. Shares in Credit Suisse have fallen 57% in the past three years, far more than its competitor UBS, which has lost only 34%. Among the candidates to replace Dougan, the newspaper names Walter Berchtold, a Swiss citizen in charge of wealth management at the bank, and other former senior executives at the bank such as Ulrich Körner, Leonhard Fischer and Hugo Bänziger.
Franklin Templeton Investments is seeking to penetrate retail markets in Malaysia and Vietnam, and to create onshore activites in Taiwan and Indonesia, Asian Investor reports. In 2011, assets at the US asset management firm from Asia-Pacific rose by one fifth, to USD70.7bn. In the first quarter of this year, they have risen further to USD75.8bn.
The British asset management firm Ignis Asset Management, still not widely known to French retail clients, has made a name for itself with inflows of EUR400m in one year, to a basic product, a government bond fund entitled Ignis Absolute Return Government Bond Fund, which has gained 7.4% in the 12 months to the end of March (compared with 0.8% for the Eonia), with an information ratio of 2.CIO Chris Fellingham explains to Newsmanagers: “We are adepts of real absolute returns. The Absolute Return Government Bond fund has target volatility of 4% to 6%, but in reality it is below this range, at 3.3%, with a low correlation with other asset classes, including govies. We see it as an alpha product, while most other managers consider absolute returns to come from beta: at the end of the day, those are long beta products.”The CIO goes on to explain the resources deployed to earn such high returns with a product investing in a relatively banal asset class. “We also rely on a cocktail of expertise, with macro analysis, which is indispensable in the govies markets, a quantitative team, and an exclusive piece of software (which is not a “black box”) that we have been developing internally since 2005, entitled ClearCurve. This tool decomposes and deconstructs the interest rate curve, which we have been able to use to generate stable performance gains.” In addition to this, the fund has a low management commission (0.30% for the institutional share class), “which reflects the confidence we have in our performance, since we charge a commission of 10% on performance exceeding the Eonia (with high watermark,)” says Chris Fellingham.
Tensions in the euro zone in the wake of elections in Greece and France have led investors to adopt a more prudent attitude in early May. Bond funds have posted a record net inflow of USD8bn in the week to 9 May, according to statistics from EPFR Global.Equity funds, however, saw net outflows of USD3.5bn. Emerging market equity funds in particular saw their heaviest outflows since the beginning of the year in the first week of may. US equity funds finished the week to 9 ay with outflows of USd4.78bn, while European equity funds have posted their heaviest outflows since July 2011, due to subscriptions from institutional investors in German equity ETFs. French equity funds, however, saw significant outflows.Money market funds, for their part, have posted subscriptions totalling a net USD12bn.
Skandia Investment Group’s Skandia European Best Ideas Fund managed by Lee Freeman-Shor has awarded a EUR34m mandate to Richard Plackett of BlackRock. The move to bring in Placket coincides with the 4th anniversary of the EUR340m fund.
Cheyne Capital Management has announced the launch of two UCITS IV compliant funds: the Cheyne Global Credit Fund and the Cheyne European Real Estate Bond Fund. Their investment portfolios are based on those of two existing flagship Cheyne strategies.The Cheyne Global Credit Fund is an actively managed, directional UCITS IV compliant fund offering weekly liquidity. It positions investment grade and crossover credit, primarily in North America and Europe, where the team believes credit spreads are currently pricing in too much downside given the very robust fundamentals of most corporate balance sheets. Cheyne’s corporate credit team manages net assets of USD1.3 billion. The Cheyne Real Estate Bond Fund is a UCITS IV compliant fund focusing on high quality real estate-backed bonds offering weekly liquidity. Cheyne’s real estate debt team has also net assets under management of USD1.3 billion. The team has identified a compelling investment opportunity arising from the structural dislocation in Europe’s EUR1.4 trillion real estate debt market, offering attractive yields with strong downside protection.
As of 31 March, assets in the long-term savings division of Old Mutual, which includes assets managed by Skandia, totalled GBP116.1bn, Fundweb reports. Assets in British-registered funds increased 6% compared with the end of December, to GBP35.6bn, while British platform funds gained 8%, to GBP20.4bn.
Net inflows at Axa Wealth, the British arm of the Axa group, totalled GBP845m in first quarter, down 11% compared with first quarter 2011, Fund Web reports. Assets under management as of the end of March 2012 totalled GBP20.1bn, compared with GBP18.6bn in first quarter 2011. Assets on the Architas platform were up 37% in first quarter to USD10.7bn.
Household savings, which are essential to the functioning of the economy, are subject to all kinds of legislative initiatives, particularly in the area of taxation. “Unfortunately, the current policy on savings is not totally up to the challenge of financing our ecnomy,” the chairman of the French financial market authority (Autorité des Marchés Financiers, or AMF), Jean-Pierre Jouyet, claimed on 11 May at the 2012 academic AMF and ACP conference (the latter being the French prudential control authority), dedicated to the consequences of the financial crisis on household savings and sales of financial products. According to the AMF chairman, two major reasons underlie the inadequacies of the tax framework. On the one hand, “some tax incentives are particularly burdensome and have an exaggerated influence on household savings.” In this context, tax breaks tend to be “the alpha and omega of sales of financial products. Neither prospective returns, nor risks, nor the object of financing are taken into account sufficiently at the time the investment decision is taken,” says Jouyet. Meanwhile, the current structure of tax incentices is extremely piecemeal, and sometimes lacks coherence, “due to a desire to treat every particular case and tax break, and to promote this or that activity, in such a way that each legitimate aim unfortunately leads us into a complex and illegibile framework, in which the real contribution to supporting growth and to long-term investment is difficult to measure,” says Joyet. He therefore calls for a “cleaning up of our savings tax policy, so make it support the growth of our country and returns for savings investors.”
The New York-based asset management firm Arden Asset Management will help the State of Massachusetts to transfer several hundred million US dollars invested in the portfolios of hedge fund managers. Reuters reports that Arden AM has won a transition manager mandate for the Massachusetts state pension fund, whose assets under management total about USD50bn. Capital invested in funds of funds will be moved to direct investments in a selection of hedge funds. The pension fund has about 10% of its assets invested in hedge funds. Assets under management at Arden AM total about USD6.5bn.
Fidelity Investments has announced the launch of its first two income funds to focus on international equities (bringing the number of income equity funds in the Fidelity range to 10). The products are the Fidelity Global Equity Income Fund, which is aimed directly at retail investors, and the Fidelity Advisor Global Equity Income Fund, which is available only via financial advisors. The objective for the product, managed by Ramona Persaud, is to outperform the MSCI All Country World index.Management commission is capped to 1.20% for the retail share class, 1.20% for the institutional share class, and 1.45%, 1,70% and 2,20% for Advisor share classes A, T, and C respectively.