Funds Management

Even the biggest fund managers have to change with the times, and the US$750 billion Fidelity is staring down a world that’s moving beyond the traditional investment landscape in which its business was built.

It’s a narrow path to a Goldilocks financial environment with steep drops on either side. Should markets tumble off the edge, big investors could cast their eyes back over macro hedge funds, long-short strategies and gold.

The world’s largest asset manager has picked up Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP) in a move that will give it greater access to the fastest-growing segment of the private markets and define “the next 20 years” of its business.

Geopolitical tension, US electoral uncertainty and a commercial real estate crash loom as the fastest-rising risks for the financial services industry next year, according to the latest industry poll by securities post-trade giant, DTCC.

Tactical Global Management has merged with local quant shop Alpha Vista, expanding its product suite with an eye to winning new clients locally and globally.

The newly launched Scarcity Partners wants to help take emerging asset managers to the next level. With stormy weather still forecast for markets, it’s a great time to buy.

Teams from Pzena and Invesco scored highly against the Northern Trust-backed Essentia Analytics’ Behavioural Alpha Benchmark, a system designed to differentiate between luck and true investment nous.

The growing scale of the carbon credit market – and the fact that the next stage of emissions abatement isn’t going to be as simple as the last – means that more institutional attention is warranted, according to Apostle. Just watch out for the volatility.

Pure play equities managers bore the brunt of market turbulence and lost mandates to super fund consolidation and the Your Future Your Super performance test. But diversified and alternatives managers fare better than most.

Magellan’s ambitious plans to return to the heights it previously occupied are as shaky as ever. There’s hope that the ship might still be righted, but it won’t be David George doing it.

Howard Marks thinks that markets and the investors that ply them are going to experience massive change in the next decade. If his latest memo is right, credit instruments could come to represent the majority of portfolios.

As international sustainable manager Osmosis looks to expand in Australia, a large university has become one of the first investors in the local vehicle for its ex-fossil fuels strategy.