A new report “from the coalface” of super fund investing has gone some way to quantifying the cost of shonky investment management, with members potentially losing out on hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Surging equity markets have driven the Future Fund’s return higher, but its prediction that inflation will be stickier than expected has been born out and it “remains conscious of the potential for significant deterioration”.
Awards, with hedge funds charity event, to go ahead
The annual Australian Alternative Investment Awards, held in conjunction with Hedge Funds Rock, an important annual fund raiser for a variety of charities, will go ahead on, or near, the pre-ordained date of September 10. Given the crisis, this year’s awards and the fund raiser are more important than ever.
Kim Ivey, chairman of the Alternative Future Foundation which is managed by the Hedge Funds Rock organisation, one of the initial supporters of the fund raiser, a co-founder of what became AIMA Australia, and chair of the awards themselves, said last week: “Make no mistake; Hedge Funds Rock 2020 will take place this year.”
How it takes place – either virtually or at an actual dinner at a big venue, as normal- and precisely when it takes place, are in the laps of the COVID-19 gods, or devils. Ivey provided the latest committee resolution to industry participants last week (see below). The analytics-providing partner, Mercer, and the major sponsors, are all on board.
The awards night, with Hedge Funds Rock, is the biggest event of the year for the alternative funds management industry sector. Last year there were 420 attendees on the night. The annual AIMA Australia conference, held in the same week and which includes familiar faces in its organisation, attracts more than 300 attendees. In Australia, the second week in September is called ‘hedge funds week’ as many overseas participants at the two events wrap around meetings and their own functions to coincide.
Ivey said last week: “If ever you wanted to hold awards for the best performers in a market downturn, this would be the year to do so.” Getting the managers’ performance figures in a relatively short period of time is not easy. Mercer is the repositoriy for the manager data and the committee members help in prompting the fund managers to submit their numbers. Apparently, if your numbers are good, you don’t take as much prompting.
Hedge Funds Rock was started in 2002 by Caroline Dodds, CEO of Cure Our Kids, was the principal annual organiser for several years, with her main aim to raise money for that charity. The awards were introduced in 2006. The number of charities has broadened in recent years and their selection is now overseen by the separately managed Alternative Future Foundation (see list of charities, also, below). One more charity has been added to the list this year: the ‘Women’s Community Shelters’, which helps women and their families to escape domestic violence.
Ivey said the committee aimed to get a shortlist of award candidates out to the industry by early August. This would give finalists time to produce some video content – usually very entertaining when presented on the night – for the proceedings. What happens this year in that regard is yet to be finalised. The awards categories (see below) are the same as last year.
– G.B.
