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27/03/2012

Espirito Santo recruits bankers from Deutsche Bank

José Ignacio Ruiz-Garna, Fernando Coscollar, Diego Martínez and Daniel Alonso, private bankers from Deutsche Bank in Spain, have joined Banco Espirito Santo, which is recruiting for its own retail and private banking division in the country, Funds People reports.Banco Espirito Santo has 115 wealth management banking advisers (for clients with EUR25,000 to EUR1m) and private banking advisers (for those with over EUR1m). Its affiliate Espirito Santo Gestión manages 83 Sicavs and 48 funds with EUR1.5bn in assets.
27/03/2012

Threadneedle launches a fund in Italy

Threadneedle has launched the US Contrarian Core Equities Fund in Italy, Bluerating reports. The Luxembourg-registered fund is managed by Guy W. Pop, managing director and portfolio manager at Columbia Management.
27/03/2012

Azimut hopes to increase foreign assets to EUR2.7bn

The Italian asset management firm Azimut is planning to reach EUR2.7bn in assets under management outside Italy by 2014, Il Sole – 24 Ore reports. Currently, counting the firm’s assets in Monaco, Switzerland and Turkey, “foreign” assets are slightly under EUR1bn. Azimut is also reportedly interested in Brazil. In Italy, Azimut would like to increase its market share, currently 3.3%. In order to achieve that, the firm is planning to make acquisitions and may have EUR240m to EUR250m to spend, the Italian newspaper calculates. Assets under management at Azimut totalled EUR17.67bn last year; it is planning to increase this to EUR27bn by 2014.
27/03/2012

Head of equities leaves Lombard Odier

Lombard Odier Investment Managers, the asset management unit of the Swiss private bank, at the end of 2011 parted with its chief investment officer for equities, Aziz Nahas, Financial News reports. Lombard Odier has confirmed the departure. For his part, Nahas had no comment, but according to sources familiar with the matter, he is now planning to launch his own hedge fund.
27/03/2012

Warburg-Henderson sets up a distribution affiliate

The Hamburg-based real estate fund management firm Warburg – Henderson Kapitalanlagegesellschaft für Immobilien mbH on Monday announced that its new distribution affiliate, Warburg – Henderson Vertriebs GmbH, commenced its activities on 9 March. Its management team includes count Christian von Hochberg, who had previously been director of institutional sales, and distribution specialist Bodo Schrah.The new entity will be responsible for distributing 17 institutional funds from Warburg – Henderson (EUR4.1bn in assets), advising German and foreign clients, and winning new mandates.
27/03/2012

Loys appoints a co-manager

The German asset management firm Loys has appointed Ufuk Boydak as co-manager for the Loys Global and Loys Global L/S funds. The 26-year-old young man joined the firm upon completing his studies in 2009, as an equities analyst.
27/03/2012

ERAFP steps up its initiative on management pay scales

The French public employees’ additional retirement fund (ERAFP) is planning to bring its full weight to bear in the debate over the governance of publicly-traded businesses. Its board of directors has unanimously approved guidelines which would have some impact in the area of shareholder engagement. The French public pension fund, which currently manages EUR12bn in assets, would like to see boards of directors include 50% independent directors, that these directors not be allowed to serve for more than three terms, and that the position of chairman of the board of directors be separated from the position of CEO. In terms of pay, a director would not be allowed to get paid more than 100 times the minimum wage. Major publicly-traded businesses would no longer be allowed to hand out stock options, which would be allowed only for startups. Finally, the ERAFP claims that golden farewells and golden parachutes are not compatible with the principles of long-term investment it aims to promote.
27/03/2012

Amafi wants to change rules for market surveys

Following sanctions levelled by the AMF against the major French banks, Crédit Agricole, Natixis, BNP Paribas and Société Générale, the French financial markets association (Amafi) would like to submit a code of conduct to the French financial market authority for market surveys, Les Echos reports. The newspaper says that the code would, in theory, need to be examined by the College of the AMF within 15 days, and would be accompanied by proposed modifications to the AMF’s general rules in relation to market surveyes. The market authority says that it participated in the association’s considerations, but had no further comment.
27/03/2012

Deutsche Bank agrees to pay USD32.5m for high-risk loans

Deutsche Bank has agreed to pay USD32.5m to settle class-action lawsuits by investors who accuse the firm of having misled them before the crisis when it sold them shares backed by high-risk mortgage debts. In documents submitted to the New York Eastern District court, lawyers for investors and the bank proposed an amicable settlement which has yet to be approved by the judge, Leonard Wexler.The suit was brought in summer 2008 by a series of institutional investors, largely pension funds, who claims that Deutsche Bank sold them securities backed by real estate loans on the basis of “misleading representations which omitted important elements” about the quality of the credit.
27/03/2012

Names of ETF funds are too often misleading

In the ETF universe, the name of a product, as long and detailed as it may be, does not necessarily give the correct information about its contents. These are the findings of a study by the US consultant Casey Research (“Top 10 Misleading ETFs”). Casey has created a list of the 10 ETFs with misleading names, which includes, for example, the iShares MSCI Emerging Markets Eastern Europe Index Fund (ESR). Unlike what the name would suggest, this ETF does not cover a range of promising countries of Eastern Europe, but is exposed largely to Russia (76%), with 21% invested in Gazprom, 16% allocated to Poland, 4.1% to the Czech Republic and 3.4% to the Hungarian market. Due to the large number of products which sometimes lack transparency in their names, Casey Research emphasises that it is important to select products that are adapted to the needs of investors. The full study is attached.
27/03/2012

Cayman Islands push back deadline for registration of master funds to 21 May

The government of the Cayman Islands has announced that it will be delaying the deadline for registration of master funds by 60 days, until 21 May 2012, Hedgeweek reports. The change is due to a disagreement between the government and the monetary authority of the Cayman Islands (CIMA) over whether master funds are required to register if they have only one regulated feeder fund. The government has announced that it will soon be issuing a clarification on this point.
27/03/2012

FSA fines Coutts GBP8.8m

The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has fined Coutts & Company GBP8.75 million for failing to take reasonable care to establish and maintain effective anti-money laundering (AML) systems and controls relating to high risk customers, including Politically Exposed Persons (PEPs). The failings at Coutts were serious, systemic and were allowed to persist for almost three years. The FSA identified deficiencies in nearly three quarters of the PEP and high risk customer files reviewed.
27/03/2012

Ongoing disagreements and delays will limit the impact of Solvency 2

The Solvency 2 directive still represents “a positive force for change in the insurance sector,” analysts at Morgan Stanley claim in a study published on 23 March (“Solvency 2: The Long and Winding Road,” by Morgan Stanley/Oliver Wyman).However, the lack of political consensus or agreement within the profession mean that the bill is in danger of losing its relevance, and arriving in a final form far from the original vision of its designers. Morgan Stanley does not expect the directive to be applied before 1 January 2014, or even 2015, and in light of concerns on the part of politicians and professionals, the regulator will need to allow for long transitional periods. With this in mind, there are reasons to be concerned that there will be significant divergences between countries in the application of the rules, while heavyweights in the sector will have lost the advantages originally planned.This is thus more an evolution than a revolution, and the initial hopes that Solvency 2 would become an international point of reference for regulation of the insurance sector appears more distant than ever.
27/03/2012

Mario Draghi calls on banks to pay less in dividends and bonuses

The chairman of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, yesterday defened the German banking associations’ measures, resolved at the end of 2011, including subsidized credits for euro zone banks, Les Echos reports. Draghi welcomed the new budget treaty now in the ratification process, and the efforts on the part of Italy and Spain, but warned that guard should not be let down. Banks, he says, should take advantage of the current favourable environment to increase their resistance to shocks, by holding on to their profits instead of handing them out as bonuses and dividends.
27/03/2012

North America fund from MainFirst coming on 18 April

The German asset management firm MainFirst Asset Management has announced that its first fund investing outside Europe, MainFirst North America Fund, will be launched on 18 April (see Newsmanagers of 15 March), Fonds Professionell reports. The portfolio of 150 to 200 US and Canadian shares will be constructed on the basis of a computer-based model along with several objective criteria; it will generally invest 90% to 100% of its assets. The objective is to outperform the benchmark index, MSCI North America, but 400 to 500 basis points.
27/03/2012

NAV of Morgan Stanley P2 Value falls further

The German asset management firm Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investment GmbH at the end of this week confirmed that it has sold a 56.95% stake which the open-ended real estate fund P2 Value (DE000A0F6G89) held in the firm which owns the Trianon tower in Frankfurt to an affiliate of Madison International Realty (see Newsmanagers of 27 February). The transaction was made at a price “nearly” corresponding to the most recent expert valuation of EUR408m, which means a further loss of about 72 cents to the fund’s net asset value, to EUR21.23 per share. The sale of the stake in Trianon, after loans are paid off, would bring about EUR92m in liquidity into the fund, which in July will be required to make its fourth half-yearly distribution before it is liquidated (on 30 September 2013). As of 24 March, assets in the P2 Value fund totalled EUR622.42m.
27/03/2012

Schroders France CEO departs

Philippe Lecomte, CEO of Schroders France, will be leaving the asset management firm. He will soon be starting in a new position at another firm, in late April or early May. According to information obtained by Newsmanagers, the new firm may be La Française AM, where he would be responsible for inernational activities. Lecomte joined Schroders in 2003.At the British group, Nuno Teixeira, currently deputy CEO and head of development for all Schroders clients in France for the past year, will replace him. Teixeira will officially take over as head of teams based in Paris in April. According to John Toriano, head of institutional operations at Schroders worldwide, to whom the head of Schroders France reports, Teixeira, who contributed to the development of institutional clients in France, will now continue to grow the activities of Schroders in France, both aimed at institutional and intermediated clients. “For the past three years, the dynamic has clearly been on the side of institutionals,” the new president of Schroders France tells Newsmanagers, “but we have a clear ambition to continue to develop the two institutional and retail units.”Teixeira arrived at Schroders France in 2003, nine months before Lecomte. Before joining Schroders France, Teixeira served as deputy CEO and head of the multi-management team at Invesco Gestion (France), where he began in 1997.
27/03/2012

Rothschild & Cie Gestion and Koris sign partnership for risk management

Rothschild & Cie Gestion announced on Tuesday, 27 March, that it has signed a marketing and sales cooperation agreement with the financial investment advising firm Koris International to set up investment solutions and distribution based on dynamic risk budget controlling techniques. The techniques are conceived and developed by Koris International. For its part, Rothschild & Cie Gestion provides the financial management of the range of multi-manager, multi-asset class range, allowing the two firms to “deploy dynamic risk control management techniques as part of specific solutions adapted to the needs of investors,” the asset management firm says. These offerings will be a part of Rothschild Investment Solutions, recently created following the acquisition of Héritage AM (see Newsmanagers of 2 February 2012), which concentrates on alternative and long-only management. This is done “on the basis of open architecture, which gives us access to classic management funds as well as ETFs and hedge funds.” Then “once the selection is made, Koris will provide the equivalent of an intellectual service, by acting to dynamically control risk budgets,” says Jean-René Giraud, CEO of Koris International. The product range will be composed of funds, potentially “seeded” funds, and also mandates. The two partners will jointly provide sales of these solutions to private banking and institutional clients in France. At Rothschild & Cie Gestion, Laurent Levenq, formerly of Héritage AM, will be in charge of commercial and client development.
27/03/2012

Hedge funds wind down short positions

According to the International Strategy & Investment Group (ISI), in the past five months, hedge funds trading on the S&P 500 have accepted defeat and have sold off short positions at their highest pace since 2010, Expansión reports. The indicator, which measures the percentage of long contracts held by funds, came out at 48.6, compared with 42 in November 2011; this is the largest increase since April 2010.The index is constituted on the basis of information provided by 36 hedge funds, whose assets total USD89bn. If the index is at 50, that means long and short bets are balanced out.
27/03/2012

Vanguard manages more than USD200bn in ETFs

Vanguard has seen an increase in its ETF activities in the United States to USD204bn, even though it arrived late to this market, Financial Times Fund Management observes. The group, which is the world’s third-largest player, may soon overtake State Street, which has USD298bn. ETFs now represent 45.2% of net subscriptions for Vanguard, compared with 28.4% in 2009.
27/03/2012

Bernheim, Dreyfus & Co retains BofA Merrill Lynch

The French absolute returns strategy specialist Bernheim, Dreyfus & Co has appointed BofA Merrill Lynch as its additional prime broker for the Diva Synergy Fund and Diva Synergy Ucits Fund, Hedgeweek reports. Asset allocation for the fund between BofA Merrill Lynch and the current prime brokers and custodians for the fund will be determined depending on the type of transaction, at the discretion of Bernheim, Dreyfus & Co.
27/03/2012

Profits down at C-Quadrat

Although the German-Austrian asset management firm C-Quadrat is highlighting a 25% increase in its commission revenues in 2011 in its communications materials, to EUR44.65m, and a reduction of personnel costs from EUR8.4m to EUR6.6m, operating profits at C-Quadrat have fallen to EUR823,000 from EUR9.38m, and operating profits have fallen to EUR2.97m from EUR15.29m.Assets as of the end of the financial year were down to slightly under EUR2.93bn, from EUR3.33bn, but the increase in commission revenues is due to an increase in average annual assets and a replacement of institutional assets by higher-margin retail assets.
27/03/2012

Axel Miller leaves Petercam

Axel Miller is leaving his position as chairman of the executive committee at Petercam, a position in which he will be replaced by Xavier Van Campenhout. “Axel Miller has announced his plans to retire as a partner and head of day-to-day management of the group in order to pursue other interests,” the firm tells Newsmanagers. Miller arrived at Petercam as a partner at 2009, after serving as chairman of the executive committee at Dexia. Van Campenhout, who belongs to one of the two founding families, joined Petercam in 1998, and developed its buy-side research activities serving institutional management and private banking. From 2005 to 2010, he served as CEO of the Swiss banking affiliate, before returning to Belgium in early 2011 as head of investment policy strategy. The management committee chaired by Van Campenhout will continue to be composed of its current members: Hugo Lasat (institutional management), Fritz Mertens (private management) and Marc Janssens (intermediation activities).
27/03/2012

Norway's GPFG gives good ratings to Adidas, Nestlé and Air France

Norges Bank Investment Management, the affiliate of the Bank of Norway responsible for managing the Government Pension Fund – Global (GPFG, formerly known as the Oil Fund) has awarded its top ratings for social and environmental risks to 39 companies out of 1,078, including Adidas, Nestlé and Air France-KLM. More than one third of the firms analysed had a score of zero in this area.Walt Disney, PVH, Intel, Hennes & Mauritz, Motorola Mobility, Gildan Activewear, Xstrata, Ericsson and Anglo American are among the 14 firms which received top ratings for their reporting on risks related to child labour in 2011. Adidas, Gap, Next, Bayer and BHP Billiton for the first time appear in the list of businesses with a top score. But of the 452 businesses analysed from this perspective, 41 received no ratings, compared with 44 in 2010.11 businesses received top ratings in 2011 for their reporting on risks related to climate change, including Air France-KLM, Air Products & Chemicals, BASF and Constellation Energy Group, as well as E-ON, Hera, Iberdrola, Lafarge, Linde, Xcel Energy and Angle American. In this category, 17 of the 453 businesses analysed received zero ratings.Lastly, on reporting on issues related to water, NBIM awarded top ratings to 14 businesses out of 447, including Nestlé, Anglo American, Anheuser-Busch InBev, Danone, GlaxoSmithKline, Kellogg, Kirin Holdings, Merck & Co, Molson Coors Brewing, PepsiCo, Pfizer, PG&E, SABMiller and Sanofi. 32% of businesses received zero ratings in this area.
27/03/2012
Gestion d'actifs

L'UFF sélectionne un gérant de private equity pour lancer un FCPI

UFF Innovation 14 est un nouveau Fonds Commun de Placement dans l’Innovation (FCPI) qui offre aux clients de l’UFF un des rares accès aux entreprises non cotées. Le FCPI UFF Innovation 14 a comme objectif d’investir 100% de son actif dans des sociétés innovantes principalement non cotées, particulièrement dans les secteurs de l'énergie, des technologies de l’information et des sciences de la vie. Le FCPI investira un minimum de 40% de son actif en actions de PME éligibles. Les 60% restants seront principalement investis en obligations classiques, BSA et en avances en compte courant dans des PME éligibles en croissance, qui cherchent des solutions de financement non-dilutif à moyen terme. Le FCPI UFF Innovation 14 sera géré par l'équipe de Truffle Capital.
Gestion d'actifs
27/03/2012

Permira envisage de vendre les surgelés Iglo

Le groupe de private equity se prépare à vendre le groupe de surgelés Iglo après avoir été approché par des fonds, dont Blackstone, BC Partners et Cinven, et le montant de l’opération pourrait atteindre 3 milliards d’euros, a rapporté Reuters de sources proches du dossier. Permira, qui a mandaté Credit Suisse pour trouver un repreneur à cette ancienne filiale d’Unilever, estime qu’une vente pourrait représenter 9 fois l’Ebitda contre 7 à 7,5 fois pour une IPO.
27/03/2012

Bill Gross mise sur un QE3 en avril

Le gérant de Pimco a dit s’attendre à ce que la Fed décide en avril d’un troisième round d’assouplissement monétaire (QE3). Il mise gros sur la politique de la Réserve fédérale, l’exposition du Total Return Fund de Pimco aux titres adossés à des prêts hypothécaires (MBS) étant passée de 50% en janvier à 52% en février. En octobre dernier, cette exposition n’atteignait que 38%.
27/03/2012

Retour en Bourse en vue pour Michael Stores

Reuters croit savoir que Blackstone et Bain Capital, à eux deux détenteurs de 93% du capital, envisagent le prochain retour en Bourse du distributeur d’objets d’art américain Michael Stores. Ils l’avaient acquis en 2006 pour plus de 6 milliards de dollars. JPMorgan et Goldman Sachs dirigeraient l’IPO, dont les documents pourraient être enregistrés le mois prochain.
27/03/2012

Rothschild & Cie Gestion et Koris International en coopération

Le gestionnaire d’actifs et la société de conseil ont annoncé la signature d’un accord de coopération marketing et commercial pour la mise au point et la distribution de solutions d’investissements basées sur «les techniques de contrôle dynamique de budgets de risque conçues et développées par Koris International».
27/03/2012

Hausse des créances douteuses à Wenzhou

Le ratio des créances douteuses dans les banques de la ville emblématique de Wenzhou ont progressé à 1,74% à la fin du mois de février, après 0,37% à la fin du mois de juin 2011, selon le journal qui cite des données de la commission de régulation bancaire chinoise. Les créances douteuses ont atteint 11,2 milliards, soit une hausse de 1,79 milliards de yuans par rapport à janvier et de 2,55 milliards par rapport à juin 2011.

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