La banque privée genevoise Pictet publie des actifs sous gestion en progression de 17,7% au 30 septembre. Ces derniers s’élèvent à 244,3 milliards de francs suisses, répartis pour moitié entre de la fortune privée et institutionnelle, selon des chiffres remis au Temps mardi.
Le même jour que son concurrent MLP, le prestataire de services financiers AWD (groupe Swiss Life), a présenté ses résultats pour le troisième trimestre. Il fait état d’un bénéfice d’exploitation de 6,2 millions d’euros avant charges exceptionnelles et de restructuration, ce qui porte le solde positif pour janvier-septembre à 3,5 millions d’euros.Néanmoins, sur les trois premiers trimestres, AWD accuse une perte nette de 20 millions d’euros contre un bénéfice net de 27,5 millions pour la période correspondante de 2008, le chiffre d’affaires ayant pour sa part plongé de 19,7 % à 381,5 millions d’euros, principalement à cause des difficultés sur les marchés autrichien, d’Europe de l’Est et britannique. Les charges exceptionnelles et de restructuration ont représenté 22,9 millions d’euros, dont 15,3 millions pour juillet-septembre.
Au 30 septembre, les actifs sous gestion du prestataire de services financiers MLP ont atteint un nouveau record de 12,5 milliards d’euros contre 11,7 milliards au 30 juin et 11,4 milliard un an auparavant.Le bénéfice net du troisième trimestre est ressorti à 4,7 millions d’euros contre 0,5 million pour le deuxième, celui des secteurs d’activité conservés bondissant à 5,1 millions contre 1,4 million. Cependant, compte tenu des charges de restructuration pour certaines filiales, des frais de conseil juridique pour repousser l’OPA hostile de Swiss Life et des conséquences de la crise économique et financière, le bénéfice net de janvier-septembre est tombé à 5 millions d’euros contre 18,8 millions pour la période correspondante de l’an dernier. Quant aux recettes totales, elles se sont contractées de 15 % à 345,3 millions d’euros.MLP précise par ailleurs avoir recruté plus de 24.000 nouveaux clients durant les trois premiers trimestres, dont environ 9.200 en juillet-septembre pour atteindre fin septembre un total de 781.000 clients
Goldman Sachs et Credit Suisse ont annoncé mardi que le fonds souverain Qatar Investment Agency (QIA) a vendu la moitié de ses actions préférentielles Volkswagen, soit 25 millions de titres, pour 60 euros par action. Le titre avait gagné jusqu'à lundi soir 88 % depuis le début de l’année.Avec le milliard et demi d’euros ainsi récolté, la QIA pourra financer au moins en partie l’augmentation à 17 % contre 7 %, prévue pour décembre 2009, de sa participation dans le capital ordinaire de Volkswagen.
Le directeur du fonds de hedge funds K1 a chargé Grant Thornton de procéder à la liquidation du fonds K1 Invest qui est en cessation de paiements, rapporte Das Investment. Selon l’administrateur de K1 en Suisse, le fonds affichait environ 348 millions d’euros d’encours fin juillet, mais on ne sait quelle part de ces actifs correspond à une dette vis-à-vis des banques. K1 a été créé par Michael Kiener, qui se trouve en détention préventive depuis fin octobre et auquel la justice reproche d’avoir escroqué Barclays et BNP Paribas de 280 millions d’euros.
Première conséquence de l’acquisition par la Deutsche Bank : selon les proches du dossier, Frank Wieser, actuellement directeur de la succursale Sal. Oppenheim de Düsseldorf, rejoindra au printemps prochain le suisse Vontobel pour en diriger la filiale allemande, Bank Vontobel Europa, à Munich, rapporte la Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. Il sera également patron de l’activité de banque privée pour l’Allemagne.
BlueCrest Capital, one of the UK’s largest hedge funds, is moving a 50 staff to Geneva amid growing concerns about London’s status as a centre for alternative asset managers, says the Financial Times. The new office will be BlueCrest’s largest after its headquarters in London, where it currently employs 300 people.
Les Echos reports that “say on pay,” or the opportunity for shareholders in publicly traded firms to have a say about the pay scale of directors of the business, is becoming increasingly widespread in the United States, Switzerland, and Australia. This development is, however, being met with criticism in France, Bernard Lemée, secretary of the board of directors at BNP Paribas, explains to the newspaper. “Remuneration policies and structures for directors are often complex and rely on technicalities or ‘benchmarks’ which shareholders, or most of them, don’t have,” he says.
The CEO of the Spanish Inverco association of management firms and pension funds, Angel Martínez-Aldama , has been re-elected as chairman of the European federation of pension funds (EFRP), at a meeting held on Monday in Budapest. He will serve for a new three-year term as chairman of the EFRP. The Federation includes sixteen countries of the European Union, along with Croatia, Iceland, Norway, and Switzerland.
A Geneva court has agreed to hear a case against the former CEO and CIO of Optimal, the hedge fund affiliate of Santander, who served until October 2008, Expansión reports. Manuel Echeverría is accused of negligence of his due diligence duties to clients in the Madoff fraud scandal. According to the lawsuit, Echeverría visited Bernard Madoff at least four times per year, and earned an annual commission equivalent to 0.15% of assets in the Optimal Strategic US Equity fund, which had ties to Madoff. Echeverría joined the Swiss private bank Notz Stucki in October 2008, but his employment at that firm has recently been terminated.
As Newsmanagers reported in June of this year, the UK asset management firm Jupiter is opening operations in France. At the time, CEO Edward Bonham-Carter announced the recruitment of a salesperson and the opening of a small branch office in Paris. But ultimately, the firm has signed a partnership with Alfi Partners, a third party marketer. Jupiter, which manages assets of EUR24bn, largely in equities, is not wholly unknown to French investors, as the asset manager is indirectly represented via a fund from CCR, Centrale Croissance Europe, which it manages under a subcontract. This partnership goes back to the time when Commerzbank was a shareholder in both asset management firms, which is no longer the case today, as CCR is owned by UBS, and a majority stake in Jupiter is controlled by its employees. With Alfi, the UK asset management firm is hoping to go a step further on the French market, which it considers to be one of the most important in Europe. It is planning to target professional and qualified French investors with its Luxembourg Sicav Jupiter Global Funds, which has been licensed for sale for some time already. Among the sub-funds which will be promoted in France are an Asia Pacific fund, a climate change fund, and others.
According to Simona Paravani, a strategist at HSBC Global Asset Management and manager of the World Selection fund, investors have every reason to bet on Latin America, a region which may be expected to perform better than Asia in the whort term. The specialist points out that, on the basis of PER in the past 12 months, Latin American equities (with a PER of 15.6 times) are trading more than 40% below emerging Asian equities (at 26.3 times), compared with an average difference of only 5% over the past five years. “Latin American equities therefore appear to be somewhat undervalued compared with emerging Asia, and may potentially outperform them, particularly if economic data continues to bring surprise increases, thanks to improving domestic demand in Brazil,” Paravani says.
According to Simona Paravani, a strategist at HSBC Global Asset Management, investors have every reason to bet on Latin America, a region which may be expected to perform better than Asia. Within the region, Brazil appears to be the strongest bet. “Latin American equities are currently trading 40% below the valuations of Asian equities,” Paravani tells Citywire.
Francis Sempill, a manager at Walter Scott and a member of the management team for the BNY Mellon Long-Term Global Equity Fund and the BNY Mellon US Equity Fund, the market boom of the past six months “reflects a rally on the markets driven by massive quantities of liquidity. At their low point in March, many shares worldwide appeared to be particularly inexpensive at the same time that the pace of deterioration in macroeconomic indicators was beginning to recover.” Therefore, conditions were favourable for a rebound. “Since then, the rally has been driven by massive quantities of liquidity created by governments, rather than by genuine indicators of recovery in the global economy. This is the reason that it is certainly not a good time to set critical inclinations aside,” he warns.
Since March of this year, emerging markets equities have posted unprecedented gains, Raiffeisen Capital Management observes. Since the beginning of the year, the Russian MICEX index has gained about 120%, while the Indian SENSEX index is up nearly 70%, and Chinese equities and the Hong Kong stock exchange have gained nearly 60% in value. “Although it is unlikely that this scenario of steep increase will repeat itself in 2010, RCM estimates that emerging markets still have some potential for growth, excluding the formation of any possible speculative bubbles,” a memo says.
Deutsche Bank has announced that Boris Liedtke has been appointed CEO for the activities of Deutsche Asset Management (DeAM, USD646bn in assets as of the end of June) for Asia-Pacific ex Japan. Liedtke will be based in Singapore, and will report to Mark Cullen, Global COO of Deusche Asset Management, who also served as interim CEO of DeAM for Asia-Pacific. Liedtke has spent 8 years in Asia (in Hong Kong and Singapore) since joining the Deutsche Bank group 15 years ago. Most recently, he was COO of the DeAM/DWS Investments ensemble in Frankfurt and New York.
The director of the K1 hedge fund has assigned Grant Thornton to undertake the liquidation of the K1 Invet hedge fund, which has defaulted, Das Investment reports. The administrator of K1 in Switzerland says that the fund had about EUR348m in assets as of the end of July, but it is not known what proportion of those assets correspond to debt owed to banks. K1 was founded by Michael Kiener, who has been jailed since the end of October, awaiting trial on charges of fraud against Barclays and BNP Paribas amounting to EUR280m.
As of 30 September, assets under management at the financial services provider MLP set a new record at EUR12.5bn, compard with EUR11.7bn as of 30 June, and EUR11.4bn one year previously. Net profits in third quarter totalled EUR4.7bn, compared with EUR0.5m in second quarter, while net profits from ongoing operations rose to EUR5.1m from EUR1.4m. However, due to restructuring costs at some affiliates, legal advising costs related to the hostile takeover bid or Swiss Life, and the consequences of the economic crisis, net profits for January-September fell to EUR5m, from EUR18.8m in the corresponding period of last year. Total revenues contracted 15% to EUR345.3m. MLP also states that it recruited more than 24,000 new clients in the first three quarters of the year, including about 9,200 in July-September, for a total as of the end of September of 781,000 customers.
Though the Credit Suisse/Tremont index still appears to be in positive territory for last month, the Hennesee hedge fund index has posted its first decline after seven months of growth in October. It shows losses of 0.50%, bringing average performance in the first ten months of the year to 20.12%. The Barclays hedge fund index, for its part, is down 0.17% for October, based on a sample of 1,177 funds which had reported results as of 11 November. For January-October, average performance comes to 19.80%, despite losses of 15.02% for the 6 equity short bias funds in the sample, and 0.77% for the 35 equity market neutral funds. In October, 9 strategies out of 17 are in the red, with the heaviest losses (-1.94%) for equity long bias. For October, the best performance belonged to distressed securities (2.96%), while since the beginning of the year, the best results belong to convertibles arbitrage (48.71%), which is also the best overall in the Hennessee index, which shows performance of 40.74%, compared with 45.64% for Credit Suisse/Tremont.
Assets under management in ETF funds worldwide have set a new all-time high of USD941.85bn as of the end of October, 0.9% higher than the USD933bn recorded at the end of September, Barclays Global Investors (BGI) reports in its most recent monthly bulletin. Since the beginning of the year, assets have risen 32.5%, while the MSCI World index has gained 20.2% in US dollars. As of the end of August, according to Strategic Insight, net subscriptions have totalled USD76.8bn. As of the end of October, there were 1,859 ETF funds on sale, from 97 providers, listed 3,327 times on 40 stock markets. The number of ETF products on offer has increased 16.8%, with 336 launches and 73 closures. There are currently plans underway to launch 805 new ETF funds. BGI also states that its iShares brand remains the largest operator in the world, with 405 ETFs and assets of USD455.72bn as of the end of October, which represents a market share of 48.4%. The number two and three operators remain State Street Global Advisors (SSgA), with 106 products and USD137.08bn, and Vanguard with 40 products and EUR80.76bn. This corresponds to market shares of 14.6% and 8.6%, respectively.
Assets in 801 European ETF funds from 32 issuers, listed 2001 times on 18 stock exchanges, set a new record at the end of October, with USD205.54bn, compared with a previous record of USD204bn as of the end of September, Barclays Global Investors (BGI) announces. Since the beginning of the year, assets have increased 44.2%, while the MSCI Europe index has gained 25.5% in US dollars. According to Lipper FMI, net inflows in the first eight months of the year totalled USD23.6bn. The top three providers of funds remain unchanged; iShares (BGI) controlled 39% of the European market as of the end of August, with 168 products and USD80.2bn in assets, ahead of Lyxor Asset Management (Société Générale) with 118 products and USD41.94bn, and db x-trackers (Deutsche Bank) with 113 ETF funds and USD34.53bn. These three playors controlled 39%, 20.4%, and 16.8% of the market, respectively.
Amundi, which is pending approval from antitrust authorities in Brussels, will save an estimated EUR120m annually in economies of scale on a horizon of three years, half of which will be in IT, thanks to reduced reliance on outside providers, AGEFI reports. Internal sources say that 250 to 300 jobs will also be lost, most of them in France. These layoffs, which are not expected to include involuntary dismissal, will be expected to affect largely employees from SGAM, who will be allowed to return to Société Générale, the newspaper adds. For its part, CAAM in October 2007 pledged to save money through a 10% reduction in staff numbers, including a reduction from 70 to 30 brokers, rationalisation in IT, and the closure of the alternative management affiliate Systeia. These measures will bring EUR150m in cost savings.
The Geneva-based private bank Pictet has announced a 17.7% increase in assets under management as of 30 September. These assets now total CHF244.3bn, evenly divided between private and institutional wealth management, according to statistics obtained by Le Temps on Tuesday.
The barometer is headed steadily upwards at Schroders. In third quarter, the British management firm posted net inflow sof GBP7bn, or about EUR7.8bn, of which GBP3.7bn came from retail clients, Schroders announced on 10 November in a statement. Assets in funds under management have risen to GBP138.9bn as of 30 September, compared with GBP113.3bn s of 30 June. “Net inflows have continued to be positively oriented since the end of the quarter,” Schroders states, so that one can expect they could finish the year with excellent or record results.In the first nine months of the year, Schroders is among the top groups on the intermediary management market, with net inflows of GBP6.2bn, while the institutional unit, for its part, has brought in GBP2.4bn. IN private banking, net inflows total GBP100bn, while the positive balance for the fist nine months of the year comes to GBP8.7bn. In the quarter under review, revenues from asset management totalled GBP177.5m, compared with GBP188.1m in in third quarter 208, while costs were limited to GBP122.2m, compared with GBP127.4m previously. Over nine months, pre-tax profits total GBP121.6m, compared with GBP198.8m between January and September 2008. In private banking, revenues for the quarter totalled GBP23.6m, compared with GBP29m, while costs were limited to GBP17.3m, compared with GBP17.4m. Over nine months, taxable results total GBP21.2m, compared with GBP33.9m. The group has also earned exceptional pre-tax results of GBP57.8m in third quarter, compared with GBP71.5m previously, while pre-tax result excluding one-time elements come to GBP43.6m, compared with GBP78m.
Funds People reports that Myriam Luque, who was previously director of distribution for global markets, has been appointed CEO of the multi-management platfrom from BBVA, Quality Funds. She replaces Juan Pablo Jimeno (appointed in July), who becomes head of traditional asset management at BBVA Asset Management.
NYSE Euronext announced on 10 November that its European opaque alternative trading platform SmartPool has taken on three new members, including Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Crédit Agricole Cheuvreux, who join BNP Paribas, JP Morgan, HSBC, Credit Suisse and UBS in the dark pool. The identity of the third new member has not been divulged. SmartPool now has more than 15 members.
First fallout from Sal. Oppenheim’s acquisition by Deutsche Bank? According to sources close to the firm, Frank Wieser, currently director of Sal. Oppenheim’s Düsseldorf branch, will join the Swiss firm Vontobel next spring, to head its German affiliate, Bank Vontobel Europa, in Munich, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reports. He will also be head of Vontobel’s private banking activities in Germany.
On the same day as its rival MLP reported results, the financial services provider AWD (Swiss Life group) presented its own business update for third quarter. It reports operating profits of EUR6.2m, excluding one-time and restructuring costs, bringing the positive score for the year from January to September to EUR3.5m. However, in the first three quarters of the year, AWD has posted a net loss of EUR20m, compared with net profits of EUR27.5m in the corresponding period of 2008, while revenues for their part have fallen 19.7% to EUR381.5m, largely due to difficulties on the Austrian, Eastern European and British markets. One-time and restructuring costs represented EUR22.9m, of which EUR15.3m were in July-September.
This week, the ETC segment of the London Stock Exchange (LSE) will add the ETFS Forward Crude Oil fund to trading, an addition to the range of oil ETC funds from ETF Securities. The product replicates the DJ-UBS Crude Oil 3 Month Forward Sub-Index SM, and carries a management commission of 0.49%. The 14 oil ETC funds from ETF Securities have total assets of USD1.4bn.