Natixis annonce la nomination d’Emmanuel Lefort au poste de responsable Europe de son pôle Global Structured Credit and Solutions, qui rassemble les expertises en ABS,CLO, conseil et restructuration de portefeuille ainsi que les activités de structuration d’actif-passif et de capital des clients de Natixis. Emmanuel Lefort était depuis 2009 responsable de la structuration pour la GAPC (Gestion Active des Portefeuilles Cantonnés).

Selon Funds People, Armando Senra, patron de BlackRock pour l’Espagne et le Portugal, a recruté deux commerciaux supplémentaires.Il s’agit d’une part d’Alberto Barrenechea (ex BBVA AM) qui travaillera avec Inván Pascual sur le développement de iShares, et d’autre part, de André Themudo (ex Logoplaste), qui travaillera sous les ordres de Ricardo Comín, directeur des ventes pour la Péninsule ibérique, et qui sera plus spécialement chargé de la clientèle portugaise.

La Deutsche Börse a annoncé le 26 septembre avoir admis à la négociation sur le segment XTF de sa plate-forme électronique Xetra cinq ETF supplémentaires de droit irlandais lancés par RBS Market Access et chargés entre 0,60 et 0,90 %. Ces produits portent à 874 le nombre d’ETF cotés à Francfort.Dans le détail, il s’agit du RBS Market Access MSCI Brazil (ADR) EUR Hedged Index ETF (LU0667622541, avec un TFE de 0,60 %), du RBS Market Access MSCI EM LatAm (Brazil ADR) EUR Hedged Index ETF (LU0667622467, 0,65 %) et le RBS Market Access MSCI Frontier Markets Index ETF (LU0667622202 ; TFE 0,90 %). La série se complète du RBS Market Access MSCI Emerging and Frontier Africa ex South Africa Index ETF (LU0667622384, TFE de 0,85 %) et du RBS Market Access MSCI GCC Countries ex Saudi Arabia Top 50 Capped Index ETF (LU0667622111), chargé à 0,70 %.

Du fait de la dépréciation de deux actifs du portefeuille, la valeur liquidative du fonds immobilier allemand offert au public Morgan Stanley P2 Value a été réduite de 12 cents le 23 septembre, à 22,66 euros.Les deux actifs concernés sont un immeuble résidentiel au Japon (Glen Park Miyakojima) et un immeuble de bureaux en Allemagne, Fleetrand.Actuellement, l’encours du fonds (DE000A0F6G89) se situe à 701 millions d’euros et la liquidité brute à 78,4 millions (11,2 %).

Senior sales director and specialist pour le secteur prévoyance vieillesse chez Pioneer Investments, Lothar Traub rejoindra le 1er octobre UBS Global Asset Management en tant que responsable de l’activité partenaires de distribution/fonds offerts au public en Allemagne, rapporte Fondsprofessionell.

Threadneedle Investments prévoit de se développer en Asie, notamment sur la distribution professionnelle via des banques ou compagnies d’assurances. C’est ce qu’a confié au FTfm Raymundo Yu, le président de Threadneedle pour l’Asie-Pacifique. Jusqu’ici, la société de gestion s’est concentrée plutôt sur les investisseurs institutionnels.

Cristiano Busnardo a été nommé vice-directeur général en charge de l’Italie de la plate-forme de fonds Allfunds Bank, rapporte Bluerating. Cristiano était précédemment vice-directeur général et directeur commercial de Prima Sgr. Entre 2000 et 2009, il était responsable du marché italien de Société Générale Asset Management.

Das Investment rapporte que Jörg Mayr a été recruté pour diriger la distribution des fonds offerts au public de Berenberg Lux Invest, filiale de l’allemande Berenberg Bank, au Luxembourg, en Autriche et en Suisse.Auparavant, il était directeur de la distribution institutionnelle de l’Allgemeine Sparkasse Oberösterreich après avoir dirigé la distribution en Autriche du gestionnaire allemand Union Investment.

According to Strategic Insight, long-term mutual funds have brought in a net USD370bn in the first seven months of the year, despite the downturn in July, which may amount to less than the USD570bn in inflows in January-July 2010, but which compares very favourably to the net redemptions of USD170bn in the corresponding period of 2008, Fundweb reports.Most of the net outflows have been concentrated on Europe, where investors were reacting to the sovereign debt crisis. But USD75bn in redemptions in July were partly offset by slightly positive inflows in Asia.

Das Investment reports that Jörg Mayr has been recruited as head of distribution for open-ended funds at Berenberg Lux Invest, an affiliate of the German Berenberg Bank, for Luxembourg, Austria, and Switzerland.Mayr had previously been director of institutional distribution at the Allgemeine Sparkasse Oberösterreich, after serving as head of distribution in Austria at the German asset management firm Union Investment.

The European commission wants to put an end to kickbacks paid by asset management firms to independent financial advisors, an article first published in Ignites Europe and then reprinted by Financial Times Fund Management reports. The planned MiFID II directive, a copy of which has been obtained by Ignites Europe, includes measures inspired by the retail distribution review in the United Kingdom.

Dans le cadre d’une table ronde organisée par amLeague et Newsmanagers, Thierry Dissaux, président du Fonds de Garantie des Dépôts: Nous avons remis en cause l’ensemble de notre mandat actions au début de cette année, et la nouvelle gestion s’est mise en place à partir du mois de mai, juste avant les difficultés... Il est clair que sur les trois sociétés de gestion sélectionnées, les performances sont assez différentes. Nous leur faisons pratiquer une gestion totalement investie en euros, avec une tracking error de l’ordre de 6. Ce qui leur laisse des latitudes assez importantes. Les différences de performances sont assez significatives. Mais nous n’avons pas l’intention à ce stade d’en tirer quelque conclusion que ce soit. Ce serait prématuré.

Dans un article paru dans Option Finance, Georges Le Donge, directeur financier du groupe Terreal (spécialiste des matériaux de construction en terre cuite) explique la politique de placement de son groupe. Les questions de trésorerie, de financement et de relation avec les banques sont sous la responsabilité d’Armand Du Chayla, trésorier groupe. Les financements sont levés par le groupe et gérés par le trésorier. La principale ligne est une dette senior, d’un montant initial supérieur à 900 millions d’euros, qui a été réduite à 500 millions à l’issue de la restructuration déclenchée par une rupture de covenant et achevée en 2009. La politique de placement est centralisée et gérée par le trésorier. Nous procédons à des placements compatibles avec les règles prévues par le contrat de notre dette senior, c’est à dire extrêmement sécurisés, principalement des certificats de dépôts bancaires et des sicav de trésorerie, explique Georges Le Donge.

Total a diminué le nombre de banques dans lesquelles il dépose des fonds dans un contexte de crainte d’une crise du crédit en zone euro. Nous avons réduit notre exposition aux banques en réduisant les montants que nous déposons, le nombre de banques que nous utilisons et la durée des dépôts, a précisé le directeur financier du groupe pétrolier, Patrick de La Chevardière, au Wall Street Journal. Total, qui gère environ 20 milliards d’euros de cash, fait tourner ses fonds plus rapidement qu’avant, pratiquement au jour le jour. Il n’utilise dorénavant qu’un peu plus de dix banques. Total n’a pas indiqué combien d'établissements il utilisait auparavant. Mais les banques françaises gardent la confiance de Total, assure le groupe, qui indique continuer à largement faire appel aux plus grands établissements du pays. Pour Total, la Société Générale est une banque comme les autres, précise encore le groupe pétrolier.

Le Forum pour l’Investissement Responsable (FIR) et les Principes pour l’Investissement Responsable (PRI) ont décerné ce soir à Paris, les récompenses de la sixième édition du Prix FIR-PRI de la recherche européenne « Finance et Développement Durable ». En 2011, pour la première fois, le FIR et les PRI se sont associés pour récompenser l’excellence universitaire européenne. Le palmarès, arrêté par un jury d’experts (académiques, entreprises, parties prenantes) et présidé par Nicolas Mottis (ESSEC Business School) récompense en 2011 : Le Meilleur Article de Recherche : «Does the Stock Market Fully Value Intangibles? Employee Satisfaction and Equity Prices» Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, US Publié dans Journal of Financial Economics, 101(3), 621-640, September 2011 Alex Edmans (Grande Bretagne) Le meilleur mémoire de Master : «Meeting the challenge of impact investing: How can contracting practices secure social impact without sacrificing performance?» London School of Economics, UK Madeleine Evans (Etats-Unis) La meilleure thèse doctorale : «Institutional Change in the Making - The Case of Socially Responsible Investment» ESSEC Business School & Université Paris Ouest Nanterre-La Défense, France Diane-Laure Arjaliès (France) Les trois bourses de Recherche : «Sustainability Reporting in Capital Markets: A Black Box» Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands Alexandra Duarte Correia (Portugal) «Similarity in Values and the Perceived Trustworthiness Of Investment Funds» University of Toulouse and CNRS, France Marco Heimann (Allemagne) «Does pension funds’ fiduciary duty prohibit the integration of any ESG criteria in investment processes?» University of St. Andrews, UK Andreas Hoepner (Allemagne) Le Prix FIR, désormais FIR-PRI, est né de la nécessité de soutenir la recherche académique, encore émergente dans le domaine de la finance et du développement durable. En lançant des ponts entre le monde universitaire, les parties prenantes et le monde de la finance, le Prix se donne comme ambition d'élargir le champ d’investigation de la recherche pour permettre aux praticiens d’innover. Il participe à la valorisation de la recherche universitaire française et européenne et renforce les connaissances de l’Investissement Socialement Responsable (ISR). Les Prix sont dotés de 5 000 euros chacun et les bourses de 3000 euros. le Prix FIR-PRI a bénéficié en 2011 du soutien financier de 12 sponsors : Allianz Global Investors, Caisse des dépôts, Crédit Agricole, Dexia Asset Management, Erafp, FRR, Groupama Asset Management, Macif Gestion/groupe OFI, Natixis Asset Management, Oddo Securities, Paris Europlace et Sycomore Asset Management.

Threadneedle Investments is planning to develop in Asia, particularly in professional distribution, via banks or insurers, Raymundo Yu, president of Threadneedle for Asia-Pacific, tells FTfm. The asset management firm had previously concentrated mostly on institutional investors.

Funds People reports that Armando Senra, head of BlackRock for Spain and Portugal, has recruited two more sales staff.One of the new recruits is Alberto Barrenechea (ex BBVA AM), who will work with Inván Pascual to develop iShares, while the other is André Themudo (ex Logoplaste), who will report to Ricardo Comín, director of sales for the Iberian peninsula, and who will be in charge of Portuguese clients specifically.

Castlestone Management, whose offices were searched in July as part of an FSA Investigation, has confirmed that it will be discontinuing its activities in the United Kingdom, and laying off 20 to 25 staff worldwide, Investment Europe reports.The announcement comes one month after the group decided to discontinue its listed fund operations, which included four Irish portfolios, three of which (Aliquot Commodity, Aliquot Agriculture and Intelligent Portfolio Asset Allocation) were suspended by the Bank of Ireland, while the remaining one (Aliquot Precious Metals) was closed on 11 August.The CEO of the firm, Angus Murray, has resigned from his position to concentrate on his role as CIO for funds domiciled in the Virgin Islands (see Newsmanagers of 11 August).

In the week to 21 September, investors remained on a knife edge, awaiting decisions by the US Federal Reserve monetary policy committee. Equity funds, bond funds and money market funds saw net redemptions of USD4.46bn, USD1.04bn and USd11bn, respectively, according to estimates from EPFR Global.Outflows from emerging markets equity funds, for the eighth week running, totalled USD18bn in the week to 21 September. Equity funds dedicated to Europe have continued to be avoided by investors, with outflows since the beginning of the year totalling USD2.4bn. Equity funds dedicated to Latin America since the beginning of the year have seen net redemptions totalling USD7.5bn, compared with USD2.4bn in the corresponding period of 2010.For developed markets, the only major segment to finish the week on a positive note was international equity funds, with subscriptions to some large ETF funds. ETFs also played a role for US equity funds, where redemptions and subscriptions balanced each other out, not counting outflows from a single large caps ETF.

Lothar Traub, senior sales director and specialist in the retirement planning sector at Pioneer Investments, will join UBS Global Asset Management on 1 October as head of distribution partners/open-ended funds for Germany, Fondsprofessionell reports.

Robeco Gestions, the French asset management firm from the Dutch group, has hired three institutional sales staff as additions to its team, following the arrival of Philippe Sabbah as CEO and board member last June. Walid Aliane joins the asset management firm as institutional salesperson in charge of the financial institutions segment. He was previously at HSBC Global Asset Management, successively as head of institutional sales for Benelux and France (2004-2008), and then as product specialist for France, Benelux and Switzerland (2008-2011). Philippe Secnazi has been appointed as an institutional salesperson in the external distribution segment, which is headed by Michael Ruben, who joined Robeco Gestions in 2008. Secnazi joins from Natixis Asset Management, where he was responsible for multimanagers and private banks (2009-2011). Robeco has also recruited Charline Meslé, who becomes an institutional salesperson specialised in corporates, a segment which is headed by Carole Murienne, who joined Robeco Gestions in 2007. Meslé was previuosly at Kepler Capital Market as a fixed income broker (government bonds). Overall, the sales team, which is led by Philippe Sabbah, who is directly responsible for pension and retirement planning institutions, has six members. The new recruitments follow the departure of Arnaud Perrier, former CEO of Robeco Gestion, in February 2010.

Morgan Stanley on Monday, 26 September announced the appointment of Antoine Delon as managing director. Following the gardening leave he is currently on, Delon will assume his new role in mid-April. He will be in charge of directing the structured products sales team on the French market, and will report directly to Eugene Burghardt, director of sales and trading for France, and Aleksandar Ivanovic, head of structured product distribution for the EMEA region (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa). Before joining the US firm, Delon, 37, spent nine years at Société Générale, where he was in charge of the team covering the French retail market. In this period, he developed activities such as Adequity and the team dedicated to private banks and family offices, a statement says. In addition to the arrival of Delon, the structured products sales team at Morgan Stanley for the French market also gains two further recruits. Yves Conan, 26, becomes vice president of the structured products sales team, and will oversee the French retail market. Since 2007, he had been at Société Générale, in charge of sales of structured products on the French market via private banks, independent financial advisers and family offices. Romain Noirault, 27, becomes head of marketing for the French market. Since 2007, Noirault had addressed the French, Swiss and Asian markets at Société Générale and Union Capital Group. Morgan Stanley will also be featured for the first time in the 2011 edition of Patrimonia.

Bordier & Cie (France), the French affiliate of Bordier & Cie, Banquiers Privés, based in Geneva, announced on Monday, 26 September that Julien Magitteri has joined the firm as director of development and managing partner. Magitteri will be in charge of identifying new development opportunities, particularly serving shareholder-directors, and of creating custom innovative solutions adapted to their needs, a statement says. Magiterri, 33, began his career in 2001 at Crédit Commercial de France (CCF) as a portfolio manager. Since 2008, he has been a private banker at HSBC Private bank, in charge of development for high and ultra high net worth individuals.

Berkshire Hathaway, the firm controlled by Warren Buffett, has announced its first share buyback, due to its low share price, the Financial Times reports. The board of directors at Berkshire has said that the group’s liquidity may be used for share buybacks provided that a premium of no more than 10% over the current book value of the shares be paid, and that the consolidated cash position of the group does not fall below USD20bn.

At a presentation of its results to 31 August, Aberdeen Asset Management on 26 September announced that its profits for the fiscal year ending on 30 September will come in at the high end of analysts’ estimates (GBP262-297m), largely due to reductions in operating costs and a subsequent improvement in operating margins.For the fiscal year ending on 30 September 2010, Aberdeen had announced operating profits of GBP221.9m, compared with GBP95.7m, and pre-tax profits of GBP210m, compared with GBP85.1m (see Newsmangers of 1 December 2010).However, assets as of the end of August 2011 were down by 4.8% compared with the end of June, to a total of GBP176.9bn. Only GBP776m of this decrease is due to net outflows, bringing net redemptions for the first eleven months of the fiscal year to GBP826m. For October 2010-August 2011, segregated mandates saw net outflows of GBP6.19bn, while pooled funds had net subscriptions of GP5.36bn.In France, assets now total over EUR6bn, due to net subscriptions of over EUR500m since the beginning of October 2010. One fund which has been selling well for some time is the Aberdeen Global – Asian Local Currency Short Duration Bond Fund, a fund of Asian bonds denominated in local currencies.

Jeff Molitor, CIO of Vanguard, has announced that the US management firm is planning to rebuild a management team in the United Kingdom, after closing the bond and equity office which it had had at Waterloo. Christine Franquin has moved to the United States, and David Kirby now manages her funds from Australia, Fundweb reports.The CIO says that Vanguard will be recruiting, and the head of the team will rejoin the firm in the next few weeks. The team will be responsible for bonds, equities, and multi-asset class products. As of the end of July, assets at the British affiliate of the US group totalled GBP980m.

Cristiano Busnardo has been appointed as vice-CEO in charge of Italy for the Allfunds Bank fund platform, Bluerating reports. Cristiano Busnardo had previously been vice-CEO and director of sales at Prima Sgr. Between 2000 and 2009, he was country head for Société Générale Asset Management in Italy.

Due to the depreciation of two properties in the portfolio, the net asset value of the German open-ended real estate fund Morgan Stanley P2 Value has been revised downwards by 12 cents per share as of 23 September, to EUR22.66.The two properties concerned are a residential property in Japan (Glen Park Miyakojima) and an office property in Germany, known as Fleetrand.Currently, assets in the fund (DE000A0F6G89) total EUR701m, and the gross liquidity is EUR78.4m (11.2%).

Deutsche Börse announced on 26 September that it has admitted five new Irish-registered ETFs launched by RBS Market Access, with fees of 0.60% to 0.90%, to trading on its Xetra electronic trading platform. The new additions bring the number of ETFs listed in Frankfurt to 874.The new funds include the RBS Market Access MSCI Brazil (ADR) EUR Hedged Index ETF (LU0667622541, with a TER of 0.60%), the RBS Market Access MSCI EM LatAm (Brazil ADR) EUR Hedged Index ETF (LU0667622467, 0.65%) and the RBS Market Access MSCI Frontier Markets Index ETF (LU0667622202, TER 0.90%). The volley is rounded out by the RBS Market Access MSCI Emerging and Frontier Africa ex South Africa Index ETF (LU0667622384, TER 0.85%) and the RBS Market Access MSCI GCC Countries ex Saudi Arabia Top 50 Capped Index ETF (LU0667622111), which charges fees of 0.70%.

The Luxembourg-registered diversified fund Templeton Emerging Markets Balanced Fund, launched in May by Franklin Templeton Investments (see Newsmanagers of 10/05/2011), a sub-fund of the Luxembourg Sicav Franklin Templeton Investments Fund, is now available to French investors.The fund, which has been on sale in France since 26 August 2011, invests in equities and bonds on emerging markets. It is co-managed by Mark Mobius, executive chairman of the Templeton Emerging Markets Group, for the equities allocation, and Michael Hasenstab, portfolio manager and co-director of the international bond department, for the bond portion of the product. Asset allocation is flexible, with the sole constraint that at least 25% each must be invested in equities and bonds.The fund is also registered for sale in Spain.