Hong Kong, which receives large volumes of investment from Spain, on Friday signed a double taxation agreement with Spain, which allows it to be removed from the blacklist of countries which do not cooperate with the Spanish finance ministry, Cinco Días reports.The treaty signed by the Spanish finance minister, Elena Salgado, and obtained by Cinco Días, covers personal income tax, company tax, and taxation of non-residents. It stipulates that corporate profits may be taxed in only one of the two countries. Spanish legislation provides for an exemption for dividends earned abroad, which did not apply to Hong Kong when it was considered an offshore tax haven.
Aviva Investors has confirmed plans to bring the management of the group’s multi-management mandates, representing GBP1.3bn in assets, back into the company, Investment Week reports. Ian Aylward and Peter Fitzgerlad, senior portfolio managers, will manage the funds of funds which were previously mandated out to FundQuest. The team will also take over the range of managers of managers, which was mandated out to Close Investments.
Citywire has learned that Morgan Stanley Investment Management is to launch a UCITS III fund dedicated to emerging market corporate debt. The strategy will be managed by William Perry.
Investment Week reports that Sanlam Universal Funds has transferred the management of its Global Equity fund from Pictet, and awarded it to Centre Asset Management. The US-based consulting firm Centre Asset Management will now take over management of the GBP8bn fund domiciled in Dublin, which Pictet has managed for the past 5 years.
The German financial management association BVI on 1 April announced that Allianz Global Investors Europe GmbH and Allianz Global Investors Europe Holding GmbH have joined the professional organisation. The two firms have their headquarters in Munich. Allianz Global Investors Europe GmbH is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Allianz Global Investors Europe Holding GmbH, which is 100% owned by Allianz Global Investors AG. The association says in a statement that, counting these two new additions, it now has 85 members, including 65 investment firms, 13 management firms, and 7 holding companies, with overall assets under management of EUR1.8trn, largely in open or closed funds.
Katrin Altmann, who previously worked at ebase and DJE Kapital, has been recruited as senior sales manager at Nestor-Fonds-Vertrieb, the German affiliate of the Luxembourg-based Nestor Investment Management SA. From 1 April, she is head of wholesale distribution, IFAs, and distribution partners. Nestor has created the new position following a strong increase in its assets. Altmann will report to Tobias Pfab, head of distribution.
Reinhard Berben, CEO of Franklin Templeton for Germany, has announced that the firm is planning to increase its presence in the diversified fund niche in Germany, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports. In addition to the classic products in this category, such as the Global Fundamental Strategies Fund, the manager is also planning to boost sales of multi-asset class funds, such as profiled products of the Strategic Allocation range, overseen by Matthias Hoppe in Frankfurt.
According to financial industry sources, Commerzbank and Sal. Oppenheim are planning to sell their stakes of 45% and 10%, respectively, in the Bavarian asset management firm KGAL (EUR25.2bn in assets), Handelsblatt reports.The shares may be bought by BayernLB, which owns 30% of capital, and the Hambourg savings bank (Haspa). However, as BayernLB is required by the European Union to reduce its balance sheet, it will not acquire a majority stake in KGAL, which it would then be required to completely consolidate.
At a press conference on Friday, Pascal Heurtault, chief investment officer at Aviva Investors France, announced that compared with a balanced portfolio consisting of 50% equities and 50% bonds and money markets, the asset management firm is currently overweight in equities (58%), after taking some profits (the proportion was previously 63%).This predilection for equities, despite the recent oil crisis and the Japanese disaster, are due to good corporate results and positive surprises in terms of profits and earnings. Margins are at their highest, and crisis management at businesses has proven effective. “The markets are not all that expensive, and they are earning more than Bunds,” says Heurtault. In addition, the context for a recovery in merger and acquitions activity is shaping up.Prime rates are expected to increase slightly, and the manager, which is cautious about German and French long-term rates, still holds some positions in Spain and Italy. The credit market has now reduced many of its spreads, but there is still potential there. Aviva Investors therefore remains positive about the banking sector. In light of continuing low interest rates, the manager is “reserved” about money markets.
Amundi ETF has celebrated its first year on the Italian market with the launch of 4 new ETFs on Borsa Italiana, Bluerating reports. They are Amundi ETF MSCI Nordic, Amundi ETF MSCI Emerging Markets, Amundi ETF Global Emerging Bond Markit Iboxx and Amundi ETF AAA Govt Bond EuroMTS.
LV= (Liverpool Victoria Friendly Society) on 31 March announced that its profits totalled Gbp21.3m in 2010, compared with losses of GBP172.2m in 2009. In the past year, assets increased by 13%, to GBP8bn as of the end of December, up from GBP7.1bn.
Andrew McCaffery, a founding member of Alignment Investors, a division of BlueCrest, is returning to Aberdeen Asset Management, a firm he left in 2008, as head of absolute return strategies. He will return as head of institutional hedge funds, and will belong to the fund of hedge fund management team (over GBP4bn in assets), alongside Graham Duce and Aidan Kearney, the British management firm announced on 31 March. McCaffery will report to Anne Richards, CIO and head of alternative investment strategies.
The head of marketing at Ignis Asset Management, Rob Page, is leaving the firm to join his former colleagues at Liontrust, Jeremy Lang and William Pattison, at Ardevora Asset Management. He will be a partner at the firm, which was launched in January 2010. James Senior, assistant head of marketing at Ignis, will replace Page.
Following the transfer of José María Martínez-Sanjuán to Santander Asset Management (see Newsmanagers of 16 March), Banif has appointed Luis Pérez Box, who had been a member of the third-party fund analysis team since 2007, as head of fund and alternative investment analysis. He had previously spent his entire career at BBVA Gestión.
Henderson Global Investors is launching a defined-contribution version of its Diversified Growth fund, whose objective is to earn 4% over the Libor 3 month. The fund will be managed by Bill McQuaker, and will be included in the retirement savings product range from HGI.
Henderson Global Investors is planning to launch an emerging markets currency fund, Citywire reports. The product would be managed by the currency team at the firm, led by Bob Arends in Amsterdam.
BlackRock has announced the arrival of Edwin Conway Managing as director of its activities serving institutionals in the United States and Canada. He will be based in New York, and was previuosly managing director and head of investor relations at Blackstone Alternate Asset Management (BAAM).
La Banque Privée 1818 and Rothschild & Cie Banque on 1 April announced that they have signed a definitive agreement to create Sélection 1818, a joint platform for independent financial advisers (IFAs), to be created from a merger of Sélection R and 1818 Partenaires. Cyril Chapelle, who was previously CEO of 1818 Partenaires, will become CEO of Sélection 1818 from 31 March 2011. The new group, which will be 66% controlled by Banque Privée 1818 and 34% by Rothschild & Cie Banque, will be known as Sélection 1818, and will be led by Cyril Chapelle, who has been named as CEO effective from 31 March 2011. It will have a hybrid management team, bringing together members of both companies. With combined assets of EUR6bn as of 31 March 2011, Sélection 1818 is a distribution platform offering a large range of investment products (banking, insurance, international, real estate), and a variety of services to assist independent financial advisers with their activities. The range, which uses open architecture, includes a variety of selections from among the best on the market.
The Kuwait sovereign wealth fund Kuwait Investment Authority (USD200bn in assets) and the Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC, USD100bn) have acquired about 4.5% of TPG Holdings (USD48bn in assets), in an operation which values the US private equity investor at about USD11bn, the Wall Street Journal reports. This will allow TPG to bring in several hundred million dollars, avoiding a potential IPO.
The real estate fund management firm Sparkassen Immobilien, which is an affiliate of the German savings banks, on 31 March announced that it has made its third investment in the Galvaniho office complex under construction in Bratislava. The property, which will have a total of 23,700 square metres of area (offices, restaurants and shops) will have an overall cost of EUR45m.