The head of Paulson & Co, John Paulson, has apologised for the unusual volatility of his funds recently, and has pledged to compensate for recent losses: he admits that he has made mistakes, and has announced that he will be making adjustments.However, the Wall Street Journal notes, there is one point on which Paulson says he will not budge: his bullish sentiment about the United States. Paulson says the troubles the US is in can be solved, and that the United States are not Europe. The American economy and stock market will improve, he predicts.

The Superior Court of California in Los Angeles has found that Jeffrey Gundlach, who has since founded DoubleLine, misappropriated trade secrets and violated his fiduciary duty to his former employer, TCW (USD120bn, Société Générale group). However, as it could not be established that Gundlach acted maliciously to damage TCW, no damages and interest were awarded to the plaintiff, the Wall Street Journal reports.Meanwhile, the jury has awarded USD66.7m in back salary to Gundlach and to the dozens of TCW employees who left the firm to found DoubleLine. They had been seeking USD496m.A judge will subsequently determine whether Gundlach made illicit use of business secrets which may be subject to reparations, for which TCW is seeking USD89m.Both parties claimed to have won the case after the verdict was announced.

The crisis of 2008 has not led to a boom in socially responsible investment, Anne-Catherine Husson-Traore, CEO of Novethic (a unit of the French group Caisse des Dépôts), regrets to say. She explains the reasons for this disappointing outcome, and says that she is confident in the future of an approach that combines best-in-class selection, normative exclusion, and shareholder engagement.

Selon La Tribune, Southwest Securities va reprendre les 20 % de Yinhua détenus par Shanxi Haixin Industrial Corporation pour 185 millions de dollars, ce qui porte à 49 % sa participation dans la 8e société de gestion chinoise.

The European fund and asset management association (EFAMA) on 16 September unveiled a project for a central European registry (European Consolidated Tape), which, under the revised MiFID directive, would offer investors much more consistent data about prices, valuations, and performance indicators, in order to foster improved execution and contribute to further reductions in direct and indirect transaction costs.The trade body says in a statement that the liberalisation of trading venue regulation under MiFID has brought many benefits for market participants. However that proliferation of trading venues has exposed weaknesses in the regulation of data quality and aggregation. This in turn has led to great difficulties in determining with certainty market prices and volumes. «All market participants have a keen interest in good quality trading data and efficient mechanisms for data consolidation. However, investment managers not only need good data to ensure they are receiving best execution for their clients, but also in order to correctly value portfolios and funds they manage», according to the EFAMA. The inability of the market to offer efficient solutions has been frustrating, especially as the costs for data feeds have continued to increase. Data providers and aggregators have divergent commercial interests and data ownership is diffused, leading to less than satisfactory, expensive data consolidation offers. Whilst it might be expected that market users would support a competitive commercial solution, this Blueprint is addressing a single official ECT. In part this reflects the absence to date of a comprehensive and enforceable solution. Commercial solutions may address many of these issues ahead of any imposed ECT but EFAMA expects that standards will still need to be set and supervised by the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA). Commenting on the publication of these reports Peter De Proft, director general of EFAMA, said: «MiFID II must improve data quality and aggregation provisions, imposing binding minimum quality standards for trade reporting and vigorously fostering data aggregation. EFAMA proposes a Blueprint for a European Consolidated Tape to contribute to the public debate on this crucial issue, and to provide buy-side input to the European Commission for the upcoming legislative measures».

Shanxi Haixin Industrial Corporation has sold a 20% stake in the fund management firm Yinhua (the eighth-largest in China, with a market share of 3.1%) for CNY1.18bn to Southwest Securities, which now controls 49% on Yinhua.According to Z-Ben Advisors, the amount paid by Southwest Securities (based in Chongqing) corresponds to 8% of assets, though Shanxi Haixin paid the same amount for a 21% stake in 2007. That amount was then equivalent to 5.23% of total assets.Southwest Securities now controls two fund management firms, after acquiring Guodo Securities earlier this year. Guodo controls 47% of Lombarda China. The legal limit has not yet been reached, as Chinese companies are allowed to control one majority stake and one minority stake in fund management firms.

The ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) on 16 September announced that it may become the next agency to lower its long-term debt rating for the Swiss bank UBS, due to fraud which has recently been uncovered in the business bank. Moody’s on Thursday announced that it was considering a similar move.The ratings agency has placed the A+ long-term debt rating for the Zurich-based establishment on ratings watch with a negative outlook (RWN), following the discovery of fraud by a UBS trader who lost the firm USD2bn, which may lead to a loss in third quarter.The Fitch ratings agency, for its part, has confirmed its long-term debt issuer (IDR) rating of A+ and short-term rating of F1+ for the business. The long-term rating has been given a stable outlook. The fraud, however, represents a serious setback for UBS’ efforts to win back the confidence of clients in its business banking activities, Fitch says.

In a filing dated 12 September, Cambria Investment Management Inc (CIME) and Cambria ETF Trust applied to the SEC for an exemption under the 1940 Act, to allow them to launch several actively-managed ETFs. The products would be allowed to invest in open-ended or closed funds or in other ETFs, and thus could also be ETF funds.The Cambria Domestic Equity Strategy ETF will be the first fund in the new series. It will use a proprietary quantitative approach based largely on an algorhythm.

Philip Poole, who has recently been appointed has head of macro and investment strategy at HSBC Global Asset Management (HSBC GAM), will soon unveil a single house investment strategy, which will be used by all of the firm’s various divisions, Asian Investor reports.The decision follows the group’s abandonment of various brands, such as Halbis in alternative management, Sinopia for quantitative and structured products, and Republic in private wealth management, in favour of a single brand, HSBC Global Asset Management.Analysts and managers at the various entities have continued to produce their own macroeconomic and investment scenarios, as previously, which has sometimes led to contradictory messages being sent to clients. Hence the decision to speak with a single voice on the subject of macroeconomic predictions and investment strategies.Assets under management at HSBC GAM total about USD465bn.

In the week to 14 September, it was clearly fears of a Greek default which motivated investors’ decisions. Redemptions from European equity and bond funds reached a five-week high, according to statistics from EPFR Global.Equity funds overall, however, posted a net inflow of USD9bn. It is true that US equity funds saw their largest inflow since mid-June 2008, but only due to a single tracker fund, which saw inflows of over USD12bn in the week. However, excluding this singular inflow, redemptions from actively-managed funds were more or less offset by subscriptions to passive funds.In Europe, equity funds were hit hard by the rise in rates for Greek and Italian debt. Redemptions in the week meant that for the first time since the beginning of the year funds show a net outflow for the year as a whole to mid-September, with redemptions to retail clients cancelling out engagements from institutional clients to German equity funds.Bond funds, largely due to investor interest in emerging and US markets, finished the week under review with a net inflow of USD2.62bn. However, money market funds, after several week of significant subscriptions, saw net redemptions of USD16.7bn due to questions about the role of short-term credit in the financing policies of European banks.

The European network of responsible investment forums Eurosif has announced the appointment of François Passant as president of the association, replacing Matt Christensen, who has moved to Axa IM. Passant has worked at Vanguard Investments Europe as executive director.Eurosif has also announced the appointment of Anders Nordheim as its new head of research. Nordheim has previously worked as an analyst at International Shareholder Services (ISS), and as a financial advisor at a wealth management firm.The two new recruits will be based in Brussels, the new headquarters of Eurosif, after its move from its previous headquarters in Paris.

The Luxembourg-based Alceda Fund Management, an affiliate of the Hamburg-based Aquila Group, on 6 September registered its UCITS-compliant Sicav AC Quant in Spain. The Sicav will be offered for sale by Allfunds Bank. So far, the AC Quant-Spectrum Fund, a UCITS III-compliant CTA fund, will be the only product offered. Alceda becomes the thirteenth foreign management firm to be issued with a license by the Spanish regulatory since the beginning of this year, following the French firms Mandarine and Neuflize Private Assets, among others.

In an interview with the Börsen-Zeitung, Martin Zielke, a board member at Commerzbank in charge of retail and professional clients, says that the bank has recently created 65 special centres to offer more adapted service to high net worth and demanding clients, such as doctors and lawyers. The units are largely concentrated in urban centres such as Hamburg and Rhine/Main, as a migration trend toward larger cities is continuing.The division is expected to contribute EUR1bn to the bank’s profits in 2012, but has brought in only EUR200m in the first half of 2011; the cost/income ratio for the division, at 88%, is clearly too high. However, the IT merger with Dresdner Bank and the reorientation of the branch network of the new group has brought EUR300m in savings, and the number of branches will be reduced to 1,200 from 1,500 currently.

The Börsen-Zeitung reports that Simon Klein, director of ETF activities at Lyxor Asset Management for Europe, on Friday announced that the asset management firm will from next week (beginning on 19 September) be reducing the counteryparty risks for its synthetic replication ETFs, by reducing swaps to zero every night.

GLG Partners, which is now an affiliate of Man Investments, has announced the launch of a UCITS-compliant version of another of its offshore hedge funds at the end of July. It is an Irish-registered product, the GLG European Equity Alternative, whose management team uses a long/short market neutral strategy for European equities.CharacteristicsName: GLG European Equity AlternativeISIN code: IE00B5429P46Management commission: 2%Performance commission: 20%

In Europe, Fitch Ratings has counted 100 credit UCITS funds, which have an absolute return objective and employ hedge fund strategies, representing assets of about EUR20bn, in a report entitled “Credit ‘Newcits': Widely Available, Not Always Suitable.” These credit Newcits funds have seen 5% growth since the end of 2010, and 36% growth since the end of 2009. According to Fitch Ratings, 10 new funds have been launched in 2011. Five asset management firms account for about 70% of the sector in terms of assets. The leader is GAM, followed far behind by Amundi, Threadneedle, Henderson and Insight. Fitch Ratings warns that due to liquidity and leverage limitations, the UCITS framework is not suitable for all alternative credit strategies. As of the end of August 2011, credit UCITS funds using hedge fund strategies had earned positive returns since the beginning of the year. About one quarter of funds had earned a return uncorrelated with credit markets. Less than 6% have achieved returns above 5%.

The ETF provider iShares has made modifications to the benchmark indices for several of its products, in order to reduce tracking error, FundWeb reports. The changes will be accompanied by name changes, in order to represent the index changes. The iShares MSCI EM Latin America ETF is now based on the MSCI EM Latin America 10/40 index, which replaces the MSCI EM Latin America Index. The fund will now be known as the iShares MSCI EM Latin America 10/40. There are also plans for several real estate funds to change their benchmark indices: iShares FTSE/EPRA European Property Index, FTSE EPRA/NAREIT Asia Property Yield, FTSE EPRA/NAREIT Developed Markets Property Yield Fund, FTSE EPRA/NAREIT UK Property Fund and FTSE EPRA/NAREIT US Property Yield funds.

The 869th ETF to be listed on the XTF segment of the Xetra electronic platform from Deutsche Börse on 15 September became the RBS Market Access CTA Index Fund, which as its name indicates replicates the evolution of the RFS CTA index. The index is composed 50/50 of the sub-indices RBS Systematic CTA and RBS Discretionary CTA, which cover a diversified portfolio of hedge funds which use the CTA (Commodity Trading Advisor) strategy.The fund is a Luxembourg-registered (LU0653608454), swap-based product, which charges fees of 0.75%.

The guaranteed fund range form Deka International (a Luxembourg affiliate of the German firm DekaBank) on 30 September will grow by one fund, with the launch of the Deka EuroGarant Strategie, for which initial subscriptions will remain open until 29 September.The fund will allow investors to participate in the evolution of the EuroStoxx 50 Risk Control 12 Excess Return index. According to the level of volatility anticipated by the Euro Stoxx Volatility Index (Vstoxx), the management team may vary the exposure to equities from 0% to 150%.After the first six-year investment period (29 September 2017), shares will be redeemed at at least 103.5% of their initial price. In the following periods, at least 100% of the price of the shares at the beginning of the period will be guaranteed at its end. A restructuring commission of 3.% may be charged at the start of each new investment period (the first of which will be on 2 October 2017).CharacteristicsName: Deka EuroGarant StrategieISIN code: LU0656616918Front-end fee: 3.50%Management commission: 1.02%

Amra Balic, director of the credit ratings division of Standard & Poor’s for Europe, is joining BlackRock in London as head of corporate governance and responsible investment (CGIR) for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. She will report to Michelle Edkins, Managing Director and Head of the Corporate Governance and Responsible Investment team, based in New York. The team has 20 specialists based in five major global regions.

The executive director of Williams de Broe, Colin Lewis, has suggested that the firm may change its name, following the acquisitin by Investec Group of Evolution Securities, which had been the owner of Williams de Broe, Money Marketing reports. A spokesperson for Investec says that no decision has yet been taken at this stage. However, in March 2010, Investec acquired Rensburg Sheppards, which has since been renamed as Investec Wealth & Management.

The British asset management firm Pershing Limited (BNY Mellon group) has announced that it is planning to launch a custody platform aimed at independent financial advisers (IFA) and financial planning entities in the United Kingdom in October.The solution has been successfully tested for 18 months on the US market for Registered Investment Advisors (RIA). It uses open architecture, and is a customisable solution which offers IFAs a single point for custody and asset administration in all asset classes.It also uses the global trading capacities and IT solutions of Pershing, including an advanced workstation with integrated portfolio management and an investor portal.

Alan Miller, former chief investment officer (CIO) at New Star, has launched a consulting unit, SCM Financial Planning, as part of the wealth management operation SCM Private, FundWeb reports.

The Danish pension fund PKA is investing DKK375m, or about EUR50m, in an international real estate fund, as part of its strategy to increase its investments in real estate outside Denmark, the website IPERealEstate reports. PKA, which in the past few years has privileged Danish real estate investments, is investing in the SPF II fund, managed by the Danish asset management firm Sparinvest. The fund aims for annual performance of about 13%. With this new engagement, PKA’s investments in international real estate total DKK1.4bn, while investments in the Danish domestic real estate market total DKK11.5bn. Assets under management by PKA total about DKK150bn, or slightly over EUR20bn.

La crise de 2008 n’a pas permis à l’investissement socialement responsable de prendre vraiment son essor, regrette Anne-Catherine Husson-Traore, directrice générale de Novethic (filiale de la Caisse des Dépôts), qui explique les raisons de cette déception. Elle croit par ailleurs au développement d’une approche mêlant "best in class", exclusion normative et engagement actionnarial.

L’agence de notation Standard & Poor’s (S&P) a indiqué le 16 septembre qu’elle pourrait abaisser à son tour la note de dette à long terme de la banque suisse UBS, en raison de la fraude révélée la veille au sein de la banque d’affaires. Moody’s avait annoncé jeudi envisager une mesure similaire.L’agence a placé la note de dette à long terme A+ de l'établissement zurichois sous surveillance avec implication négative, après la découverte d’une fraude d’un trader d’UBS qui a perdu 2 milliards de dollars et qui pourrait provoquer une perte au troisième trimestre.L’agence de notation Fitch a de son côté placé sous surveillance avec implication négative la note de solidité financière d’UBS. Sont en revanche confirmées les notes d'émetteurs à long terme (IDR) A+ et à court terme F1+. La note à long terme a été assortie d’une perspective stable. La fraude représente toutefois un sérieux revers dans la tentative d’UBS de regagner la confiance dans son activité banque d’affaires, souligne Fitch.

Valartis a poursuivi de manière conséquente ces dernières années son repositionnement stratégique sur la gestion de fortune privée. La banque se trouve actuellement dans une phase de croissance, qui se caractérise par une accélération de la collecte nette, mais aussi par un ratio charges/produits supérieur à la moyenne, a indiqué Gustav Stenbolt, CEO du groupe, dans une interview à l’agence allemande AWP. Valartis avait fait état pour le premier semestre de l’année d’une perte de près de 20 millions de francs suisses mais aussi d’une très forte croissance de la collecte nette à 577 millions de francs suisses (NewsManagers du 24 août).

Le Credit Suisse va solder les affaires d’évasion fiscale l’impliquant en Allemagne. Selon un communiqué de la banque, le Credit Suisse Group et le parquet de Düsseldorf (Allemagne) sont parvenus à un accord dans la procédure visant des collaborateurs du Credit Suisse. Celle-ci sera entièrement close après versement d’un montant de 150 millions d’euros (à comptabiliser au 3e trimestre 2011).

Le directeur exécutif de Williams de Broe, Colin Lewis, a laissé entendre que la firme pourrait changer de nom après l’acquisition par Investec Group d’Evolution Securities qui avait dans son escarcelle Williams de Broe, rapporte Money Marketing.Un porte-parole d’Investec a indiqué qu’aucune décision n’avait encore été prise à ce stade. On rappelle toutefois qu’en mars 2010, Investec avait acquis Rensburg Sheppards, renommée depuis Investec Wealth & Management.

Alan Miller, l’ancien chief investment officer (CIO) de New Star, a lancé un pôle de conseil, SCM Financial Planning, au sein de son activité de gestion de fortune SCM Private, rapporte le site FundWeb.