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05/03/2012

New York pension funds invest in D.E. Shaw and Brevan Howard

A growing number of public pension funds are increasing their investments in alternative management, either in hedge funds or private equity, Bloomberg reports. The two major alternative management firms D.E. Shaw and Brevan Howard will receive USD350m each from the New York police and fire departments pension fund. The New York pension fund, whose assets under management total about USD70bn (as of 30 November 2011), will also invest USD200m in Brigade Capital Management. Investments by the pension fund in hedge funds will total USD1.35bn, barely half of its objective of USD3bn.
05/03/2012

Deputy head of external distribution leaves Carmignac Gestion

Nicolas Demoro, who had for more than five years worked at Carmignac Gestion, serving independent financial advisers, firstly as regional director for south-eastern France, and then as deputy director of external distritbution, has left the firm to open a new entrepreneurial venture dedicated to wealth management.
05/03/2012

Avenir Finance IM: Two managers take over from Guillaume Nicoulaud

Following the departure of Guillaume Nicoulaud, manager of the quantitative fund Opéra US, the asset management firm Avenir Finance Investment Managers (AIFM) has placed the management of the fund in the hands of Guillaume Garchery and Emmanuel Faik, managers at AFIM since September 2009 and July 2011, respectively.Gerchery, a former quantitative trader in the statistical arbitrage team at Société Générale Corporate & Investment Banking from 2006 to 2009, where he was in charge of development and application of low-frequency strategies on European equities, joined Avenir Finance Investment Managers in order to implement quantitative equity and global macro strategies in particular. He worked on the development of equity strategies based on risk premiums, which were implemented with US Opéra.Faik, previously in the Investment division at the European Central Bank, which manages the currency reserves for the European system and the implementation of the Securities Markets Programme for bond markets, contributed to publications from that institution on the subject of unconventional monetary policy.
05/03/2012

Carmignac practices exclusion for its funds

Edouard Carmignac, founder of the eponymous asset management firm, has been excluding weapons manufacturers and tobacco producers from his funds for 20 years, Financial Times Fund Management reveals. Eric le Coz, deputy CEO, says in the FT weekly supplement that the exclusion is not an explicit policy of the fund, but that a study is underway to “formalise the process.” The move comes at a time when regulations will require French asset management firms to disclose how they take environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues into account.
05/03/2012

Risk of hedge fund fire sales still looms, says FSA

The British Financial Services Authority (FSA) claims that there is still a systemic risk of fire sales of assets by distressed hedge funds during periods of market turbulence, according to its most recent study of the sector (“Assessing the possible sources of systemic risk from hedge funds.»)The most recent surveys by the FSA suggest that the footprint of hedge funds remains modest in most markets, with the possible exceptions of convertible bond, interest rate derivative and commodity derivative markets.For most hedge funds, leverage remains relatively low, and most funds estimate that they would be able to liquidate their assets more rapidly then the deadlines on their liabilities, which suggests that the transformation of maturities into liquidity is not highly developed. The FSA adds, however, that these estimates are not necessarily appropriate in times of market stress.Statistics also suggest that counterparties have increased their requirements in terms of margin calls, and toughened up the terms for hedge fund exposures since the financial crisis, which has increased resistance to hedge fund defaults.
05/03/2012

Change in managers for a Scottish Widows small caps fund

Scottish Widows has decided to entrust the management of the Scottish Widows HIFML UK Smaller Companies Alpha fund to an in-house team. As a result, the fund, which had previously been managed by Harry Nimmo, the small caps specialist at Standard Life Investments, will now be managed by two members of the SWIP equities team, Gregor Macdonald and Andrew Paisley. They are also responsible for the management of the SWIP UK Smaller Companies fund and the SW UK Smaller Companies fund. At Standard Life Investments, Nimmo manages the SLI UK Smaller Companies fund, whose assets under management total GBP1bn, the Standard Life UK Smaller Companies trust (GBP140m), and the SLI Global Smaller Companies fund, which has recently been created.
05/03/2012

“We can offer funds for all investment objectives”

Unlike the group overall, whose assets totalled USD670.3bn as of the end of December, the French affiliate of Franklin Templeton continued to post net inflows in fourth quarter last year. Dominique de Préneuf, CEO, attributes this result both to the quality and variety of products on offer, and to the vast diversity of client segments.
05/03/2012

Henderson and Tantallon close Asian hedge funds

The British asset management firm Henderson Global Investors on 23 February closed its Asia-Pacific Multi-Strategy fund, launched in 2006, Asian Investor reports. Its assets under management total about USD30m. According to a spokesperson from Henderson, the fund has a good track record, but has not managed to attract new investors. The Singapore-based firm Tantallon, for its part, has closed its long-only fund, the Bass Rock Fund, whose assets under management totalled about USD145m as of the end of 2011. Macquarie Funds Group and Pinpoint Asset Management have recently taken similar measures to confront a difficult environment for hedge funds.
05/03/2012

Two Italian asset management firms merge

Sara Assicurazioni is selling Mc Gestioni to Zenit Sgr, according to an article in Milano Finanza. The operation, which is pending approval from the Bank of Italy, would create an asset management firm with EUR800m in assets under management.
05/03/2012

Former JP Morgan head to launch his own hedge fund

Mike Stewart, global head of proprietary trading at JP Morgan in London, and former head of emerging markets, will launch his own hedge fund, Whart Stewart, in second quarter, the Financial Times reports, citing sources familiar with the matter. The emerging markets team at the bank will join him at the new fund.
05/03/2012

State Street offers two new equity ETFs

The SPDR ETF range from State Street Global Advisors (SSgA) on 28 February grew with the admission to trading on NYSE Arca of two new equity products.One of these, the SPDR MSCI ACWI IMI ETF, whose acronym is ACIM, replicates the MSCI All Country Investable Market index; it charges 0.25%.The other, the SPDR AM 50 ETF (EMFT), tracks the MSCI EM 50 emerging markets index, which covers the 50 largest shares of the MSCI Emerging Markets index. Its total expense ratio is 0.50%.
05/03/2012

Invesco RE and Hannover Leasing liquidate a US fund

The property located at 33 Maiden Lane in New York has been sold for USD207.5m to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York by an institutional real estate fund from Invesco Real Estate and Hannover Leasing, which earned capital gains on the sale of 56%.As the fund had already sold the property at 10 Exchange Plance in New Jersey for USD285m, the fund will be liquidated. The two properties were acquired in 2002 for USD330m. Over the life of the fund, the performance in US dollars was 12.5% per year.
05/03/2012

Good start to the year for Dutch hedge funds

In January, the Finles/IEX Hollandse Hedge Fund Index (HHFI) of Netherlands-based hedge funds outperformed the Deutsche Bank (+1.76%) and Lyxor (+1.30%) indices, with gains of 3.42%. The index includes 29 products; at the end of January, it stood at 105.46.The three best-performing funds in the HHFI were the gold long/short fund Gold & Discovery Fonds, with gains of 17.71%, the Bloemendaal (long/short equity) fund with +11.47%, and the statistical arbitrage fund HiQ Market Neutral (+10.15%).
05/03/2012

Lyxor lists three more ETFs in Madrid

On 2 March, the CNMV registered three more ETFs from Lyxor Asset Management (Société Générale group). They are the Lyxor ETF Russell 1000 Growth, Russell 1000 Value, and Russell 2000.
05/03/2012

DWS launches guaranteed bond fund

The CNMV on 2 March issued a registration for the passively-managed fund DWS Bonos 2016, which at maturity (on 20 September 2016) offers returns of 4% per year for A-class shares (retail) and 4.45 for B-class shares (institutional) subscribed to before 28 March 2012. The management of the fund, launched on 20 February by DWS Investments (Spain), SGIIC, SA is outsourced to the German firm DWS Investment GmbH.Until 28 March 2012, the portfolio will be invested in cash, repos of Spanish public debt, savings accounts, private bonds, and liquid public and private money market instruments of the OECD region (rated at least A-), with an average maturity of less than 3 months. The fund will then be 95% invested in corporate bonds (of which up to 33% is to be invested in securities rated below BBB-), and the remainder in public debt rated at least A-. There will be no currency risk, and the fund will not invest either in other funds, or in securitisations.CharacteristicsName: DWS Bonos 2016, FIISIN codes:ES0127098004 (A class shares)ES0127098012 (B class shares)Minimal subscriptionA class shares: EUR10B class shares: EUR600,000Management commissionsA class shares: 0.2% until 28 March 2012, then 1.2%B class shares: 0.2% until 28 March 2012, then 0.8%Early withdrawal penalty2% from 29 March 2012 to 19 September 2016
05/03/2012

Liberbank releases a telecoms guaranteed fund

The firm born of the merger of Cajastur, Caja de Extremadura and Caja Cantabria, Liberbank, has launched the guaranteed fund Liberbank Telecommunicaciones 3X7, which offers returns of 0.93% per year (3% until maturity in July 2015), plus a participation in the evolution of the share prices of Telefónica, France Télécom and Deutsche Telekom, Expansión reports. Returns on these shares will be 7% per year if the average share price for the three firms remains higher than the initial value.Management commission is set at 0.75% until the end of the sale period on 24 April.
05/03/2012

Guernsey, a preferred place for fund administration

Hedge fund managers in the United Kingdom have a marked preference for Guernsey. According to a survey by Fund Domiciles, 24% of them have their funds domiciled in Guernsry, compared with 21% in the United Kingdom, 18% in Jersey, 12% in the Cayman Islands and 9% in Luxembourg. For 24% of managers, administration services for their funds are done in Guernsey, compared with 20% in the United Kingdom, 18% in Ireland, and 16% in Jersey. According to Fund Domiciles, these results reflect the rise of Guernsey to third place in the evaluation of the market in terms of stability. Guernsey is especially highly regarded by the private equity sector. The number of establishments with a license as of 2011 totalled 35, as Bank Sarasin has not renewed its license, down from a peak of 79 at the end of the 1990s.
05/03/2012

Investors steer clear of Europe

Appetite for risk has remained high in the last few days of February, but investors have been avoiding Europe, due to uncertainty about Greek debt and a downturn in growth in the region. European equity funds have seen levels of redemptions in the week to 29 February not seen in 14 weeks, according to statistics from EPFR Global.Equity funds overall nonetheless posted net inflows of USD4.7bn, and net subscriptions since the beginning of the year have totalled USD24bn, compared with USD40.2bn in the corresponding period of 2011. In the last few days of February, US equity funds have posted net subscriptions totalling over USD3bn.Bond funds in the week attracted more than USD5bn in assets, and USD48.8bn since the beginning of the year, compared with USD15.5bn in the corresponding period of 2010. As of the end of February, high yield bond funds have posted inflows of over USD1bn. Since the beginning of the year, they show inflows of over USD22bn.Money market funds, for their part, have seen redemptions totalling USD21bn in the last week of February, while European money market funds have posted their heaviest outflow since 2007.
05/03/2012

CIC handed a fresh purse

Jesse Wang, executive vice president, says that the sovereign fund China Investment Corp last year received additional financing of USD30bn, Agefi reports. The head refused, however, to say whether this amount would be used to purchase assets in Europe. “It’s not because Europe has its problems that we will be changing our examination methods,” the manager says.
05/03/2012

HansaInvest recruits from H&A

On 1 March, Herbert Dietz, who had been a director at Hauck & Aufhäuser Asset Management (H&A AM) in Munich, joined HansaInvest Hanseatische Investment GmbH as director of distribution. He will be in charge of intensifying relationship management for distribution partners, and will report to Dirk Zabel, a member of the board responsible for distribution.
05/03/2012

Pension fund deficits still declining

In February, the average coverage rate for the liabilities of US corporate pension funds increased by 2.1 percentage points, to 76.2%, following a major increase of 1.6 points in January, according to estimates by BNY Mellon Asset Management. The improvement is due to the fact that equities in February had their fifth consecutive month of gains.On average, assets in corporate pension funds increased by 2.7 points in February, while their liabilities fell by 0.2% due to a 3 basis point rise in the discount rate for businesses rated AA, to 4.33%.
05/03/2012

BlackRock bullish on Asia-Pacific

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Mark McCombe, chairman of BlackRock for Asia-Pacific, says the firm is “bullish” on the Chinese economy, as the Chinese government has done a good job of managing it centrally through times of numerous economic uncertainties, with the situation in Europe and structural issues in the United States. He is also bullish on India, due to the entrepreneurial spirit there, but its major challenge is infrastructure, and it will take time for the country to catch up with China in this area.McCombe says that he has always regarded Indonesia as a sleeping giant, which is now trying to overcome its structural problems. In Australia, the overactive economy actually reflects growth in inter-regional trade, and the fact that growth in China is advancing at a fast pitch, which means that China will need to find resources or partners capable of supplying it with commodities it needs, and Australia is in a position to be that partner.
05/03/2012

Institutionals admire example of Canadian pension funds

Canadian public pension funds appear as precursors in the eyes of institutional investors, who are seeking to imitate them, The Economist reports. It’s not the size of the funds which interests investors – they manage over USD640bn in assets – so much as their investment strategy. Unlike many pension funds, Canadian institutions manage their portfolios internally and invest directly. They invest more than other funds in buyout operations, infrastructure and real estate. The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (OMERS) would like to have 90% of its assets managed internally by the end of 2012. Canadian pension funds often make small solo transactions, but they undertake larger operations as co-sponsors with major private equity firms. This strategy allows thm to make substantial savings, particularly in private equity, where the famous standard commission level is 2/20 (2% of assets and 20% of profits). This approach has manifestly paid off. In the past ten years, the Ontario teachers’ pension fund, a pioneer in this area, has earned the best returns of the 330 largest public and private pension funds in the world.
05/03/2012

Franklin launches a fund of global convertibles

Franklin Templeton on 24 February launched a fund of global convertible bonds, which will be managed by Alan Muschott, Money Marketing reports. The fund will be registered in Luxembourg, and will use the same strategy as a fund domiciled in the United States launched in 1987.
05/03/2012

Market effects account for most of increase in assets for Luxembourg funds

Global assets in Luxembourg based funds totalled EUR2.15708trn as of the end of January, an increase of 2.89% in one month, the CSSF reports. The Luxmebourg regulator says the positive variation in the month of January of EUR60.659bn was the result of market effects totalling EUR55.407bn (+2.64%), and inflows of EUR5.162bn (+0.25%). There were 3,837 collective investment organisms (OPC) and specialised investment funds (FIS), compared with 3,845 the previous month. 2,421 entities have adopted a multiple sub-fund structure, which represents 11,857 sub-funds. With the addition of the 1,416 entities with traditional structures, a total of 13,273 entities are active on the financial market, a statement says. As of 31 January 2012, over a sliding 12-month period, net asset volumes fell by 1.23%.
05/03/2012
Gestion d'actifs

La Caisse de Retraite des Sénateurs de Belgique a sélectionné les mandataires de son appel d'offres Specialty Managers

La Caisse de retraite des sénateurs de Belgique a sélectionné, fin février, six gérants pour son appel d’offres Specialty managers, avec l’aide de la société de conseil Econopolis Strategy. Les mandats de gestion discrétionnaires étaient répartis sur plusieurs thèmes d’investissement spécialisés: Le lot 1 portait sur une poche d’actifs ISR énergie. Il a été attribué à KBC AM. Le lot 2 concernait une poche agri-food. Son gérant sera Petercam. Le lot 3, real assets, n’a pas été adjugé. Le lot 4 sur les actions européennes large cap a été attribué à Edmond de Rothschild AM et Capital at Work (Banque Delen) Le lot 5, actions à haut dividendes a été attribué à Axa IM et KBC AM Chaque lot du mandat est compris entre 5 et 10 millions d’euros. Il s’agit uniquement de poches actions. La Caisse de retraite des sénateurs de Belgique gère un portefeuille d’actifs de 180 millions d’euros. Seuls 40 % de ces encours sont externalisés. Pour lire l’avis complet: cliquez ici
Gestion d'actifs
05/03/2012
Gestion d'actifs

d' incubation, une nouvelle façon d' investir pour les institutionnels

L'incubation de sociétés de gestion a le vent en poupe et devient un vrai business. Encore adolescente dans cette activité, la France compte une poignée de sociétés qui en ont fait une spécialité alors que la Place financière de Paris vient de se doter de son premier fonds d'incubation. Si les institutionnels sont attirés par cette nouvelle catégorie d'investissement, la prudence reste, malgré tout, de mise.
Gestion d'actifs
05/03/2012

Un fonds s’invite au capital de Latécoère

Selon Le Figaro, le fonds de gestion alternative Alura Partners a franchi le seuil de 2% du capital de l’équipementier aéronautique. Le groupe a finalisé en décembre dernier sa restructuration financière avec ses créanciers bancaires et entend prendre part à la consolidation du secteur «dans un horizon de 2-3 ans».
05/03/2012

Naxicap Partners entre chez Lipp

Le fonds d’investissement a racheté 37% du capital de Groupe Bertrand aux fonds L Capital et Capzanine. Fondé par Olivier Bertrand, le groupe compte notamment parmi ses enseignes la brasserie Lipp et les boulangeries Moisan. Olivier Bertrand en reste le PDG et le premier actionnaire.
05/03/2012

Des fonds s’organisent pour la branche peinture auto de DuPont

Reuters croit savoir que des fonds de capital investissement tâchent d’unir leurs forces pour tenter de racheter les activités de peinture pour véhicules de DuPont, dont le prix pourrait dépasser 4 milliards de dollars. Blackstone se serait d’ores et déjà allié avec Bain Capital, tandis que le fonds Clayton, Dubilier & Rice ferait équipe avec CVC Capital Partners.

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