L'annonce d'un probable ralentissement des rachats d'actifs de la Fed renforce l'attrait pour les loans funds protégés des variations de taux

Selon la presse italienne, la Commission européenne va libérer l’Italie de la procédure contraignante de déficits budgétaires excessifs lancée en 2009. Cette décision pourrait permettre de desserrer l'étau sur un pays soumis à une cure d’austérité drastique, et détendre ses taux d’emprunt.

Selon la presse italienne, Bruxelles mettra un terme mercredi à une procédure pour déficits excessifs engagée en 2009 contre l'Italie

Joëlle Castiglione, agent comptable à la CRPCEN, La Caisse de Retraite et de Prévoyance des Clercs et Employés de Notaires lors d’une matinée de formations institutionnelles organisée par Morningstar : Les instances dirigeantes de mon régime ont décidé de réaliser une partie des investissements possibles dans la classe d’actifs obligataire. Les investissements de diversification sur l’obligataire s'élève à 50 millions d’euros. Nous sommes accompagné du consultant Insti 7 qui nous aide à faire des prospections, et qui a proposé de ne pas choisir un gérant mais de diversifier nos investissements afin d'éclater le risque, dans une logique prudentielle. Sur les loans, cela paraît assez novateur et puis, en terme de durée d’investissement, cela ne semble pas correspondre avec la classe d’actifs que nous recherchons aujourd’hui. Mais les contextes évoluent, c’est une piste à approfondir tout de même.

Selon nos informations, la caisse de retraite IRP Auto a procédé à une remise en jeu de ses mandats de gestion sur la partie retraite, soit environ 500 millions d’euros. Avec l’assistance de son consultant Insti 7, les résultats sont attendus le 31 mai. IRP Auto avait jusqu'à présent recours à 5 gestionnaires sur des mandats de gestion diversifiée, dont Lazard Frères, Rothschild&Cie Gestion et HSBC AM. L’allocation d’actifs d’IRP Auto (sur la partie prévoyance) est d’environ 80/85% d’obligations, entre 15 et 20% d’actions et un peu de monétaire pour la trésorerie.

Après avoir révisé à la baisse ses prévisions de croissance du PIB pour 2013, le gouvernement taïwanais met au point des mesures visant à stimuler la croissance. Une annonce sera faite le 31 mai. «Ce programme de stimulus économique comprendra des mesures variées concernant notamment le marché boursier et la consommation domestique», a indiqué un porte-parole du Premier ministre.

La Chine va réduire de 60% les droits de douane sur les importations de montres suisses dans le cadre de l’accord de libre-échange que Berne et Pékin doivent signer au mois de juillet, ce qui pourrait donner un coup de fouet à l’industrie helvétique de l’horlogerie. En 2012, les ventes de montres suisses n’ont augmenté que de 0,6% en Chine continentale.

Le Koweït a nommé le ministre des Finances, Moustapha al Chemali, au poste de ministre du Pétrole par intérim, a fait savoir l’agence de presse KUNA à la suite de la démission de Hani Hussein sous la pression de parlementaires. Les remaniements ministériels n’affectent généralement pas la politique pétrolière du Koweït, dans la mesure où celle-ci est fixée par le Conseil suprême du Pétrole.

L’Ethiopie va recevoir un financement d’un milliard de dollars de la part de Banque brésilienne de développement pour la construction d’une section de la voie ferrée devant établir la liaison avec le Sud Soudan voisin. Cet accord de principe a été annoncé après une rencontre entre la Premier ministre éthiopien Hailemariam Desalegn et la présidente brésilienne Dilma Rousseff.

Le gouvernement portugais n’a pas réclamé un nouvel allégement de ses objectifs de déficit budgétaire dans le cadre du programme de renflouement, a indiqué le président de l’Eurogroupe, Jeroen Dijsselbloem. Ses partenaires européens pourraient envisager une telle option si les réformes de Lisbonne restent en place mais que l’environnement économique se dégrade plus que prévu.

Pékin a besoin d’enregistrer une croissance annuelle moyenne du PIB de 7% afin d’atteindre son objectif de doublement du PIB par habitant d’ici 2020, a fait savoir le Premier ministre chinois Li Keqiang. Ce dernier a par ailleurs qualifiée la croissance de 7,7% du PIB observée au premier trimestre d’«appropriée».

La Banque européenne pour la reconstruction et le développement prévoit de faire basculer son soutien au secteur financier polonais vers le financement de projets énergétiques. Objectif : aider le pays à réduire sa dépendance au charbon. Cette forme d’énergie assure 95% de la production d’électricité en Pologne.

Une majorité d’Etats européens sont opposés au projet de la Commission européenne d’imposer de lourds droits de douanes sur les panneaux solaires chinois, montrent des informations recueillies lundi par Reuters. Le projet de la Commission prévoit un relèvement des droits de douanes à 47% en moyenne.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The ETF platform from the BlackRock group, iShares, has extended its product range available on the Italian stock exchange with the release of four ETFs which offer diversified exposure to the corporate bond segment. They are: iShares Barclays Euro Corporate Bond ex-financials, iShares Markit iBoxx $ High Yield Capped Bond, iShares Morningstar $ Emerging Markets Corporate Bond and iShares Global Corporate Bond.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The alternative ETF management firm ProShares has announced the launch of the ProShares High Yield-Interest Rate Hedged (ticker on BATS: HYHG). For the high yield bond product, the management team uses short positions on futures on 2, 5 and 10-year Treasuries to protect the fund against the risk of rising interest rates.The new fund aims to replicate the Citi High Yield (Treasury Rate-Hedged) Index. It charges fees of 0.50%.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The John Hancock Short Duration Credit Opportunities Fund (A share class: ticker JMBAX, I share class: JMBIX) and John Hancock Global High Yield Fund (A shares: JYGAX; I shares: JYGIX) fund are now available for sale directly to retail investors, whereas three and a half years ago, these products, managed by Stone Harbor Investment Partners, were available only via asset allocation strategies from John Hancock. They are managed by teams led by Peter J. Wilby, CIO of Stone Harbor.The John Hancock Short Duration Credit Opportunities Fund is a corporate bond fund whose portfolio may be invested in investment grade bonds, high yield debt, variable rate loans and emerging market bonds, with an average duration equal to or lower than 3 years. For its part, the John Hancock Global High Yield Fund invests in emerging market debt and high yield bonds.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Franklin Templeton will soon close the Templeton Frontier Markets fund, managed by Mark Mobius, to new investors, Investment Week has learned. The group has been seeking to slow subscriptions to the fund, which has seen its assets incerease to USD1.98bn in its Sicav format as of 30 April.

The CEO of Lyxor Asset Management since March 2012, Inès de Dinechin, has given an initial review of her activities as head of one of the largest European providers of ETFs, which has recenly topped USD100bn in assets under management. The head also describes her strategy for the next few years, and insists on her desire to develop product offerings in all directions.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } As of Friday, the XTF segment of the Xetra electronic platform (Deutsche Börse) lists 1,022 products, with the addition of a new ETF launched by the Irish firm UBS ETFs plc, which is available in institutional (UBS ETFs plc – CMCI Composite SF (USD) I-acc) and retail (UBS ETFs plc – CMCI Composite SF (USD) A-acc) share classes. As these share classes have different codes, they are each counted as a separate ETF.The benchmark index is the CMCI Composite Index, which is part of the range of Constant Maturity Commodity Indices (CMCI). According to Deutsche Börse, the two new ETFs for the first time allow investors to participate in the performance of 28 commodity contracts in US dollars with up to seven maturities each.The weighting of the five commodity sectors of CMCI – energy, precious metals, industrial metals, agriculture and livestock – is determined according two thirds to economic factors (inflation rate and GDP, in the US, EU and Japan) and the remaining one third by liquidity (open interest and market volume).CharacteristicsName: UBS ETFs plc – CMCI Composite SF (USD) I-accISIN code: IE00B56HZD74TER: 1.12%Name: UBS ETFs plc – CMCI Composite SF (USD) A-accISIN code: IE00B53H0131TER: 1.29%

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Assets in securities issued by non-money market mutual funds from the euro zone rose by EUR327bn to EUR6.888trn in March 2013, compared with EUR6.561trn in December 2012, according to statistics released by the European Central Bank. The development is due to net subscriptions totalling EUR160bn, and an increase in the value of securities of equal proportions. In the same period, assets in securities issued by money market funds in the euro zone fell to EUR908bn, from EUR911bn, due to net redemptions totalling EUR2bn. In terms of ventilation by investment strategy, the annual pace of growth for securities issued by bond funds totalled 11.3% in March 2013, and net subscriptions totalled EUR55bn in first quarter 2013. In the case of equity funds, the rate was 2.4%, and net subscriptions totalled EUR43bn in the same period. For mixed funds, the growth rate was 5.8%, and net subscriptions came to EUR49bn.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } On a visit to Paris to unveil the product to institutional investors, Antoine Lesné, fixed income portfolio strategist at State Street Global Advisors (SSgA) has stressed for Newsmanagers the diversification potential which the new SPDR Barclays EM Inflation-Linked Local Bond UCITS ETF fund (ISIN code: IE00B7MXFZ59; TER: 0.55%), a fund of emerging market bonds denominated in local currencies and indexed to inflation (“linkers”) listed in Frankfurt for less than one month, with assets of USD30m, of which USD20m are seed capital (see Newsmanagers of 26 April), offers.The Irish-registered fund is aimed at investors who already hold emerging market debt in their portfolios, who are interested in the country profile/inflation coupling, as well as those who are already exposed to euro zone or global debt and who are looking for additional returns, and to private banks which are seeking to explore new areas. But it may also interest liability-driven investment (LDI) investors (since these linkers are a better match with their objectives than nominal bonds), like pension funds and pension vehicles in euros, and insurers, the specialist says.After emerging market local currency debt ETFs, corporate bonds in hard currencies and Asian local currency bonds, the new product combines both the characteristics of local currencies and the inflation-linked bond aspect. The SPDR range only lacks a fund in emerging market debt and an ETF of government debt in hard currencies, yet.The index developed by SSgA with Barclays for the SPDR inflation-linked emerging market bond fund includes issues from ten countries, virtually all investment grade (Brazil, Turkey, Chile, Israel, South Korea, Mexico, Poland, South Africa, Thailand and Russia). These countries have credible inflation indices and sufficiently liquid and developed markets. Country allocation is limited to 20% each, to avoid Brazilian or Turkish shares, for example, strangling out the others.Currently, says Lesné, the duration for the index is 8, compared with 5 for a standard index, and the average rating for issues in the portfolio is BBB.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Fundweb reports that in first quarter 2013, the period following the introduction of RDR regulations, assets in ETFs from iShares on the eight major British platforms (Ascentric, AXA Elevate, Fidelity FundsNetwork, Novia, Nucleus, Raymond James, Standard Life and Transact), increased by 16%, to GBP985m.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } According to a survey by DekaBank and the German economic research institute IW, savings investors in 23 countries in which, according to the World Bank, real interest rates are negative, are arithmetically losing over EUR100bn a year as a result, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung reports. Of this total, the hardest-hit are US investors (EUR63bn) and Germans, who are losing EUR14.3bn, equivalent to 0.5% of Germany’s GDP.This total takes into account only short-term savings accounts, current accounts, and cash savings. By applying the same real negative interest rate of 1.35% to all financial savings excluding equity portfolios and direct participations in businesses, the losses in Germany would come to EUR58bn.Meanwhile, the fact hat interest rates were considerably lower in the period from 2009-2012 than they were between 2000 and 2008 has allowed the German government to save about EUR62bn.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } For about EUR120m, the German firm Union Investment Real Estate (UIRE) has acquired the Senator office building in Warsaw (25,000 square metres) from the local promoter Ghelamco. The property will be added to the portfolio of the open-ended real estate fund UniImmo: Europa. It is the first investment by the fund in Poland.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Several British media sources on Friday reported that Cazenove Capital, whose shareholders have recently voted in favour of a planned acquisition of the firm by Schroders, has decided to slow subscriptions to the UK Opportunities and UK Equity funds, managed by Julie Dean, which have nearly GBP2.5bn in assets, from wealth managers, while maintaining access via platforms.Meanwhile, Cazeonve has announced that it has been licensed by the Securities & Futures Commission and has opened a wealth management office in Hong Kong. The new office will be led by Sandy Dudgeon, managing director of Cazenove Capital Management Asia Ltd. Dudgeon will be assisted by Robert Ridland, fund director, and Catherine Chow as office manager.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } According to Funds People, sales by the real estate units of the savings banks, Bankia, Novagalicia and Catalunya Banc are in progress: the firms in question have already made contact with investment banks and private equity investors including funds from Morgan Stanley, Cerberus, NorthLink, Fortress and Apollo who are preparing bids for assets of the nationalised institutions.The “bad bank” Sareb is also in the process of negotiating its first major sale of a portfolio of residential properties to a group of investment funds. The properties, which may be sold for EUR200m, are largely located in Andalusia and Valencia. The buyers include Apollo Global Management, Colony Capital and the US billionaire Wilbur Ross.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Richard Bruens, global head of private wealth management and global head of product solutions at ABN Amro Private Banking International, will on 1 August join Van Lanschot as head of its private banking activity. Bruens had been a member of the executive board at Renaissance Capital in Moscow from 2007 to 2010.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Axa Investment Managers Italia has won two new mandates to manage pension funds, Bluerating reports, citing the newspaper Il Mondo. The firm will manage the diversified equity sub-fund of the pension fund Previp, for a total of EUR60m, and for five-year. It will also manage a part of the resources of the “stability” allocation of Fonchim, a corporate pension fund for employees in the chemical and pharmaceutical industries, totalling EUR360m, until January 2016.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Outlooks for a normalisation of US monetary policy are beginning to concern investors. Due to the gradual recovery of the US economy, the US Federal Reserve may soon decide to end its policy of quantitative easing, which in first quarter contributed to the strength of equity markets.Despite these concerns, equity funds have posted a net inflow of USD7.49bn in the week to 22 May, according to statistics released by EPFR Global, which nonetheless notes an increase in interest in Japanese equity funds, although subscriptions denominated in euros to these funds are at a 75-week high.Bond funds finished the week ending on 22 May with a net inflow of USD4.49bn, while money market funds showed inflows of slightly over USD16bn.

P { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Assets under management by the Frankfurt-based MainFirst Asset Management total about EUR4bn, of which slightly over half is in the form of mandates, compared with EUR3bn as of the end of 2012, Olgerd Eichler, a partner at the MainFirst Bank group, has told Newsmanagers. Eichler is manager of the Luxembourg-registered European equity fund MainFirst Top European Ideas (50-55 positions), whose assets have now risen to EUR1.45bn after a dip, and which has posted net subscriptions of about EUR200bn since the beginning of the year. Eichler also manages three mandates totalling about EUR600m.Robert Focken, head of wholesale distribution, has also announced that the new bond fund MainFirst Emerging Markets Corporate Bond Fund Balanced, launched in fourth quarter 2012 (see Newsmanagers of 9 October) with the team recruited from Clariden Leu already has EUR200m in assets. The second team recruited last year, which comes from Deutsche Asset Management, has recently launched the MainFirst AR Multi Asset Fonds (see Newsmanagers of 7 May), while the third is expected to initially concentrate on managing mandates.