Our Authors

(Pictured: Mark Cernicky) The big call for global fixed income managers this year is not so much the continued search for yield or even the need for more credit, but how to benefit from the restructuring in the energy sector. According to Mark Cernicky, Principal Global Investors managing director and head of global fixed income, the…

(Pictured: Tony Booth) The annual survey by Liquidnet of traders at asset management firms around the world, published last week, shows a major concern about liquidity to cover an anticipated increase in global investment flows. The flows are mainly expected into the US and EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa). The survey of 115 buy-side equity…

(Pictured: Jason Hsu) by Greg Bright In the 1990s Russell Investments launched two ASX indices in Australia, a Russell Value Index and a Russell Growth Index. They shut them down a few years later because no-one wanted to pay for this information. I’m starting to wonder whether the very notion of ‘value’ and ‘growth’ has subsequently…

(Pictured: Lynelle Briggs) John Coombs has retired from the board of Maritime Super after 20 years with the fund. The former boss of the Maritime Union of Australia, who famously defied the Government by refusing to let radioactive waste cross the docks, is being replaced by Lynelle Briggs, a former chief executive of Medicare. Briggs, a…

(Pictured: David Adiseshan) David Adiseshan’s Southern Cross Financial Advisers is co-hosting a symposium on the US Venture Capital market and its opportunities for Australian investors with the US Consulate General in Sydney and Melbourne, April 21 and 22. Invitees are mainly super funds and family offices. Southern Cross is a division of the financial planning group…

(Pictured: Adrian Stewart) by Greg Bright PIMCO will be rolling out several new fixed income strategies to the retail market, following its decision announced last week to insource retail distribution back from Equity Trustees (EQT), its long-time partner. The world’s biggest bond manager has also strengthened its institutional distribution team. Adrian Stewart, Australian country head, said…

(Pictured: Ross Chapin) Parametric Portfolio Associates, the after-tax and implementation-efficiency manager, is to introduce a range of index funds in Australia as well as its global emerging markets capability as it prepares, also, to enter the high-net-worth market. On a regular visit to Australia last week, Ross Chapin, a managing director and head of strategy, said…

(Pictured: Warren Chant) The finalists of the Chant West 2015 Super Fund Awards have been announced by the research house Chant West. The fund ratings firm has announced finalists across 12 categories, including Super and Pension Funds of the Year. Seven industry funds, three retail and commercial multi-manager funds, one public sector fund and one corporate…

(Pictured: Paul Harrison) by David Chaplin Boutique New Zealand manager Salt Funds Management has won perhaps the largest New Zealand equities mandate on record, scooping up NZ$690 million (A$670 million) from AMP Capital NZ, doubling the small firm’s FUM in the process. Paul Harrison, Salt director, said the AMP mandate provided scale for the firm, whose…

(Pictured: Danielle Press) by Patrick Liddy Winston Churchill stated that “Meeting Franklin Roosevelt was like opening your first bottle of champagne; knowing him was like drinking it.” You meet people like that in business occasionally. They show different thinking in their industries and are able to apply this to complex issues. It even happens, from time…