Citi has expanded its transitions and portfolio solutions capability with the appointment of Greg Woodham as a vice president. He previously ran the Goldman Sachs’ Australian transitions business, which was shuttered in August. Woodham will be responsible for the management of multi-asset class portfolio transitions, derivative overlays, currency overlays and other portfolio related solutions for…
George Vassos, a well-regarded funds management industry identity, passed away last Thursday, December 1, after a battle with cancer. He was 47. Vassos was a co-founder and the managing director of Omega Global Investors, a $3.4 billion Melbourne-based global investment boutique, which was launched at the height of the global financial crisis in 2008. The…
By Greg Bright Believe it or not, there are a few free lunches in investment management – strategies which can deliver savings that are the equivalent of no-risk alpha. The biggest of these, the longest free lunch if you will, is after-tax management. Last week investors and managers spoke out on the issue. At roundtables…
Changing the behaviour and processes of a big organisation, such as a super fund, is never easy. There are usually several stakeholders involved who need to be convinced of the changes, including, arguably the most important, the humble administrator. At the PwC/Parametric roundtables on investment efficiencies last week (see separate report), Shannon Goard, the national…
Twenty years ago Sheridan Lee wandered, “aimlessly”, up and down the east coast of America calling fund managers to try to represent them in Australia. “All I lacked was a business plan and experience,” she said at her company’s big birthday bash last week. “I knew before Donald Trump did that that was a potentially…
Willis Towers Watson has recruited Sue Brake, one of the people who put together the governance structure for the launch of NZ Super and a former adviser to the IMF, in a senior consulting role based in Sydney. Brake started this month in a role which she describes as “across the board, with an emphasis…
Matt Lawler, the former chief executive of Yellow Brick Road, has joined OneVue as executive general manager of Wealth Management Services. In a passionate address to the company’s AGM Connie Mckeage outlined not only the future for the company, including Lawler’s role, but also the future for retail investment admin generally. Mckeage, the founder and…
A new analysis has debunked the assumption that low fees inevitably equate with better outcomes for investors, at least the investors in the New Zealand KiwiSaver market. Australian investors can readily be substituted. The study, released by Australian research house SuperRatings last week, found there was “often an inverse relationship between fees and investment outcomes…
After a five-year burst of portfolio realignment, sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) have slowed their pace of change, according to new research. But they continue to increase exposure to alternatives. An International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds (IFSWF) survey released earlier this month found the “significant shift” towards alternative assets initiated by members over the previous…
(pictured:Â Kathryn Saklatvala) bfinance, the UK-based manager search and consulting business which set up shop in Australia this year, has proposed a redefinition of the alternative beta market, which it says has expanded by 30 per cent in just the past nine months. bfinance, which provides a different business model to that of the mainstream asset…
