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02/03/2011

Aviva Investors is a shareholder in Azimut

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Since 24 February, Aviva Investors Global Services Limited has been controlling 2.01% of publicly-traded capital in the Italian management firm Azimut Holding spa, Bluerating reports, citing Consob.
02/03/2011

Ignis AM launches an absolute return government bond fund

Ignis Asset Management is to launch the Ignis Absolute Return Government Bond Fund at the end of March. The fund will target net returns of 2% to 3% per annum in excess of cash2 by actively trading a portfolio of global government bonds and currencies.The fund will be managed by head of rates, Russ Oxley, and chief economist, Stuart Thomson, and will be the first retail proposition from Ignis’s rates team, which manages in excess of GBP28 billion on behalf of institutional investors.The fund, a Luxembourg-domiciled UCITS III SICAV, will invest primarily in government bonds, but will also take long and short positions in money market instruments and derivatives. Foreign currency exposure will be limited to 25%.
02/03/2011

State Street extends its cooperation with Britain's PPF

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } State Street on 28 February announced that it has been reappointed for a five-year mandate by the Pension Protection Fund (PPF), from 1 January 2011. The mandate, on assets of GBP5bn, has covered the provision of custody and administration services since 2005. In 2008, the mandate was extended to include risk analysis and independent valuation of OTC derivatives. The PPF has added securities lending services within the renewed mandate.
02/03/2011

Ed Rosengarten joins Eden Group

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The former head of equities at M&G. Ed Rosengarden, has joined Eden Group as head of asset management, Investment Week reports. In his new role, Rosengarten will be in charge of developing the client base and creating new products.
02/03/2011

Swiss Life doubles profits in 2010, partly due to AWD

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } In 2010, net profits at Swiss Life more than doubled, from CHF277m to CHF560m. Swiss Life says in a statement published on 2 March that the Investment Management sector took in CHF4.6bn in net returns on owners’ equity for its insurance portfolio. This corresponds to a net return on investment of 4.1% (compared with 3.9% the previous year). With earnings up 34% compared with the previous year, the Investment Management sector contributed CHF103m to the group’s profits. The successful reorientation of AWD, whose earnings were up 4% last year to EUR547m, has had impressive results: an operating profit of EUR49m (compared with -EUR41m the previous year), and an increase in the margin on earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) to 9% (from -8% the previous year).
02/03/2011

Assets under management up by over 14% at Cantonal Bank of Basel

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Assets under management at the Cantonal Bank of Basel as of the end of 2010 totalled CHF33bn, compared with CHF28.9bn the previous year, the bank has announced in a statement. Net profits at the group totalled CHF254.3m, down 12.1% compared with the record results of the previous year, which were boosted by exceptional factors.
02/03/2011

GAM posts net inflow of CHF8bn in 2010

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } For its first complete fiscal year, the Zurich-based asset management group GAM, which has been listed on the stock exchange since October 2009, posted an increase in its assets under management of 4%, to nearly CHF118bn, Agefi Switzerland reports. Net inflows totalled CHF8bn (CHF400m one year earlier) despite a downturn in second half. Net profits were up 35% to over CHF202m.
02/03/2011

Assets under management up 1.1% at BCGE

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Assets under management and administration at the Cantonal Bank of Geneva (BCGE) as of the end of 2010 totalled CHF18.2bn, largely due to the arrival of new clients, compared with CHF18.05bn one year earlier, the bank announced on 1 March. Net profits were down 21.2% to CHF56.4m, due to one-time charges (ongoing project to transfer IT infrastructure, for CHF10m, and provisioning for business risks and trade finance for EUR30m).
02/03/2011

Schroders recruits for distribution

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Leonardo Fernández, client director, has been appointed as head of sales, in charge of intermediaries at Schroders España, Funds People reports. He will report to Carla Bergareche, CEO for Spain.The British asset management firm currently employs 11 people in Spain, where its assets totalled about EUR2.9bn as of the end of 2010.
02/03/2011

Threadneedle AM recruits in Hong Kong

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The management firm Threadneedle on 28 February announced the appointment of Albert Lee as a senior advisor. Lee, who will be based in Hong Kong, will be in charge of laying out the group’s strategy in Asia, in close collaboration with the president for Asia-Pacific, Raymondo Yu. Lee previously worked at Merrill Lynch Securities. He is currently also senior advisor to the wealth management department at Nomura International in Hong Kong.
02/03/2011

A label for ethical funds at last?

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } According to L’Echo, the Belgian Socialist senator Philippe Mahoux has tabled a bill which would promote socially responsible investment (SRI). The ethical character of funds of this type has previously been subject to internal control by issuers. The bill would give the CBFA authority to issue a label, the newspaper states. Currently, 197 funds are billed as socially responsible investment products, according to statistics from the Belgian Asset Management Association. Their assets under management have quadrupled since 2004, to EUR7.66bn (according to statistics as of second quarter 2010).
02/03/2011

Sparinvest takes over asset management activities of Atrium Partners

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The Danish asset management firm Sparinvest announced on 1 March that it has acquired Atrium Asset Management, the portfolio management affiliate of Atrium Partners, for an undisclosed amount. The firm manages two European small caps funds with total assets of EUR55m, entitled Atrium Value Partners SICAV - European Small Cap (domiciled in Luxembourg) and Atrium Value Partners – Europa Small Cap (domiciled in Denmark).The two managers of Atrium Asset Management, Karsten Løngaard and Lisbeth Søgaard Nielsen, will join the value equities team at Sparinvest, led by Jens Moestrup Rasmussen, which currently manages EUR3.4bn.
02/03/2011

Ole Søeberg joins Skagen Funds

Ole Søeberg is joining Skagen Funds as a portfolio manager to further strengthen the global and Norwegian equity fund SkagenVekst. He will be responsible for analysing existing and potential investments alongside a team comprising 9 fund managers. Søeberg has extensive experience in both global and Danish capital markets. He joins Skagen from his position as managing director of the insurance company Tryg where he was responsible for investor relations since 2006. For the past four years Søeberg has been a member of the board of directors of Skagen AS. He has stepped down from the Board to assume his new position. Ole Søeberg will take up his new role at Skagen in the first half of 2011.
02/03/2011

Management firms in better health than in 2007

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Asset management firms are completing their recovery. In fourth quarter 2010, operating margins in the asset management industry improved in the United States, according to a study by the New York consulting firm kasina, cited by Mutual Fund Wire. They now stand at 31.4%, compared with 27.5% in fourth quarter 2009. Net margins for 17 management firms analysed are also up, at 23.4%, compared with 21.2% one year previously. These figures signify that asset managers are now in better shape than they were in 2007 and 2008, kasina states. Among the best performers in terms of margins, Franklin Templeton and BlackRock had the best satisfactory figures among the major players. Among the smaller firms, Pzena Investment Management and Calamos Investments came out on top.
02/03/2011

Neuberger Berman appoints a managing director

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The US management firm Neuberger Berman has announced the arrival of David Kupperman as managing director of NB Alternatives Investment Management, the fund of hedge fund activity of the group. He was previously a partner and member of the investment committee at Alternative Investment Management, a fund of hedge funds.
02/03/2011

NewAlpha Asset Management makes a recruitment

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } NewAlpha, an affiliate of the OFI group which provides institutional investors with access to new managers via incubation funds, announced on Tuesday, 1 March that Fabien Dersy has joined the firm as head of sourcing, selection and relationship management for incubated managers. Dersy will be a senior analyst in charge of incubation projects. Dersy was previously head of the range of volatility arbitrage funds at Dexia Asset Management.
02/03/2011

Acropole AM to add to alternative management unit

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Acropole Asset Management, a French asset management boutique dedicated to convertible bonds, is planning to develop its alternative management activities, one of its three units, alongside traditional convertibles and credit management. So far, these activities are focused on long/short (with the Acropole LS Convexité fund) and convertibles arbitrage (with the Acropole Convertibles Arbitrage). “We are going to add a third area: volatility,” Jacques Joakimides, the CEO of the firm said. To do this, the asset manager will be recruiting for its teams. Acropole AM, with slightly over EUR700m in assets under management and 17 employees, is also in the process of recruiting a head for external distribution, to replace Marc Auchabie.
02/03/2011

CalPERS appoints a chief risk officer

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } The California pension fund CalPERS on 1 March announced that it has appointed Larry Jensen to the newly-created position of chief risk officer. The position is intended to improve the risk management programme at the pension fund, CalPERS says in a statement. Jensen was previously director of the new Office of Enterprise Risk Management at the pension fund from 1 October, and was in charge of a risk evaluation mission.
02/03/2011

Strong increase in profits at Fortress

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } As of 31 December, assets at Fortress Investment Group totalled USD44.6bn, 42% higher than one year previously, and its pre-tax distributable earnings for the year 2010 totalled USD372m, compared with USD172m. GAAP net income, excluding principals agreement compensation came to USD170m, compared with USD43m in 2009, while GAAP net loss attributable to Class A shareholders increased to USD285m from USD255m.Fortress states that it has raised new third-party capital totalling USD5.3bn, of which USD2.6bn were included in the books as of the end of December. The remaining USD2.7bn are commitments which have not yet been called in.Lastly, the asset management firm states that of this freshly-raised USD5.3bn, USD3.1bn will go to credit private equity funds, USD447m to credit hedge funds, and USD1.7bn to liquid hedge funds.
02/03/2011

German real estate funds likely to pull out of Spain

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Expansión reports that it is likely that German real estate funds will seek to liquidate most of their assets in Spain before the entry into force of a new double taxation agreement, which was concluded on 3 February between Spain and Germany, and would probably come into force on 1 January 2012. One of the terms of the agreement would make sales of properties subject to taxes in the country where the property is located, which in these cases would mean Spain. These sales would be subject to a 19% tax, without the exemption from article 14 of the Spanish last on taxation of non-residents, which applies only to dividends and not to capital gains on assets.
02/03/2011

Dow Jones and Brookfield AM launch an infrastructure index of emerging markets

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Dow Jones Indexes, the global index provider, and the management firm Brookfield Asset Management, a specialist in real estate, energy, and infrastructure assets, on Tuesday, 1 March announced the launch of the Dow Jones Brookfield Emerging Markets Infrastructure index. The index represents businesses in emerging markets which own and operate infrastructure. The index will form the basis for two mutual funds, and may be used as an underlying for ETFs.
02/03/2011

FSA publishes first report on consumer protection

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } As a part of its strategy to protect consumers and prepare for the application of the new regulations arising from the Retail Distribution Review (RDR), the British FSA has published its first study of the risks related to the conduct of businesses in regard to consumers, the Retail Conduct Risk Outlook (RCRO), which, along with the forthcoming Prudential Risk Outlook, will replace the former Financial Risk Outlook. The report draws particular attention to distributor influenced funds (DIF), structured funds such as open-ended investment companies (OEIC), in which the distributor, generally an advising firm, has some control over the architecture or the management of the fund. The FSA states that there are at least 40 firms which offer DIF products to their clients. Assets under management in these funds total about GBP2bn. The control exercised by advising firms on these funds, though partial, presents a number of risks, among them the risk of conflicts of interest, as the advising firms distributing DIF products often have a direct financial interest in the products, to which they are meant to be providing consulting services. The report also points to the increasing popularity of complex investment products, including ETFs, “relatively new products” both for retail investors and for advising firms. In addition to counterparty and collateral risks, the FSA mentions conflicts of interest related to the structuring of ETFs and legal issues related to the domicile of underlyings. The marketing and promotion of complex ETFs does not always appropriately reflect the various risks related to these products, and the FSA says it has intensified its surveillance in this area and is prepared to intervene if necessary.
02/03/2011

Only one third of absolute return funds outperform the risk-free rate over three years

In 2010, 71% of absolute return funds with a sales license for Germany posted a positive result, averaging 1.96%; over three years, 61.3% of funds did so, with an average of 0.53% (compared with an average loss of 0.31% for the 36 months to the end of June 2010).In addition, according to a study by the Frankfurt asset management firm Lupus alpha on the basis of Lipper data, there was a significant distorsion in results. In 2010, the best performance was 35.99%, while the largest loss was 23.97%.On one year and three years, the proportion of absolute return funds with a positive Sharpe ratio, and thus higher gains than the risk-free rate, were two thirds and one third, respectively.As of the end of December, there were 327 absolute return funds in Geramny, compared with 266 three years earlier. Total assets as of this date toalled EUR58.4bn, putting them above the pre-crisis level (EUR58.3bn at the end of 2007) for the first time.
02/03/2011

Madoff trustee seeks USD2bn from Tremont

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Irving Picard, the court-appointed trustee for the business of Bernard Madoff, is seeking USD2.1bn from the management firm Tremont Group Holdings and its affiliates, which would be used to reimburse victims of the fraud, the Wall Street Journal reports. According to a lawsuit filed in December and amended this week, the management firm and a group of funds which it managed are claimed to have ignored warning signs on several occasions which suggested that Madoff’s activities might be fraudulent. Tremont and its affiliates are accused of having allowed more than USD4bn in assets to be transferred to Madoff over a 15-year period.
02/03/2011

Former UBS banker charged

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } US prosecutors are accusing a former UBS banker, Christos Bagios, of helping 150 high net worth US citizens to avoid paying taxes on their income, according to a penal case published on Tuesday. The banker, who now works for Credit Suisse Group, was arrested last month in New York, the Wall Street Journal reports.
02/03/2011

Former Goldman Sachs director indicted for insider trading

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } La Tribune reports that the US regulatory authority, the Securities & Exchange Commission, announced on Tuesday, 1 March that it is filing charges against a former member of the board of directors of Goldman Sachs, Rajat Gupta, for insider trading in relation to the Galleon hedge fund scandal.
02/03/2011

Goldman Sachs launches Next-11 Equity Fund

p { margin-bottom: 0.08in; } Goldman Sachs Asset Management has announced, in a filing submitted to the SEC on 16 February, the forthcoming launch of the N-11 Equity Fund, with four share classes. The promoter emphasizes that the product is “non-diversified” under the terms of the Investment Company Act of 1940.Under normal circumstances, the portfolio will invest at least 80% in equities from “next eleven” countries, or N-11, or other businesses which are active in N-11 countries (Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Mexico, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, South Korea, Turkey, and Vietnam). The fund will not invest in issuers domiciled in Iran, in light of US economic sanctions against the country.The TER for A class shares (GSYAX) is set at 1.90%, while the rate is 2.65% for C class shares (GSYCX). For Institutional shares (GSYIX), the fees are 1.50%, for IR shares (GSYRX), the rate is 1.65%.
02/03/2011

Top 10 hedge funds made USD28bn in second half

The top 10 hedge funds made USD28bn for clients in the second half of 2010, according to the Financial Times which cites data calculated by LCH Investments, an investor in hedge funds run by Edmond de Rothschild Group. This is USD2bn more than the net profits of Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, Barclays and HSBC combined, underlines the newspaper. The 10 funds have earned a total of USD182bn for investors since they were created, with George Soros making USD35bn for clients – after all fees – since he set up his Quantum Fund in 1973.

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