News

(Pictured: Warren Chant) by Greg Bright The third annual Chant West Super Fund Awards, to be announced on May 6 at a black-tie event at the Ivy Ballroom in Sydney, follows three themes for the funds which have helped Warren Chant, the research firm’s enigmatic principal, to narrow down his short list. Fees and My Super…

(Pictured: Sinclair Scholfield) State Street, the big global custodian bank and fund manager, and FNZ, the global systems company with humble beginnings in New Zealand, have forged an unlikely alliance. They are looking to provide institutional-grade securities servicing to the member-direct market. At first glance these two companies do not seem to have much in common….

(Pictured: Bruce Watson) by David Chaplin* At least one of the $NZ30 billion plus Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) investment fund’s two custodians is set to lose out as the Government-owned entity rejigs its back-office. Meantime, Australia’s AUSCOAL Super, also a JP Morgan client, goes to tender this week. In New Zealand, it appears to be a…

(Pictured: Pat Liddy) Securities servicing is going through a period of significant disruption. The SMSF movement, technological advances and heightened competition have combined to make 2015 one of the most challenging that the industry is likely to have seen. In this special report, PATRICK LIDDY rates the players and looks at the likely landscape for securities…

(Pictured: Phil Filippelis) BNY Mellon Investment Management has appointed its new Australia country head and director, institutional distribution, to replace Bruce Murphy, who moved to one of the firm’s affiliated managers late last year. The new country head, Phil Filippelis, is based in Sydney and reports to the BNY Mellon IM regional head, Mark Speciale,…

The London Stock Exchange (LSE) announced last Thursday night in London that it planned to put the investment management arm of Russell Investments up for sale, a move that was widely anticipated after it bought the owner of the Russell stock market indices last year. In June, LSE agree to acquire Russell for US$2.7 billion…

(Pictured: Amelie Delaunay) Australian institutional investors in direct property are increasingly putting their money offshore and it’s mainly going to Europe and the US, rather than within the region, according to the latest investor survey by ANREV. The Asian Association for Investors in Non-listed Real Estate Vehicles has published its eight annual survey, which also incorporates…

(Pictured: Rohit Chopra) Australian investors have had a love/hate relationship with emerging markets for many years. Like the perception of the markets themselves, they tend to go hot and cold with that part of their portfolio. However, structural changes in some of the bigger markets may be changing both the perception and reality. Rohit Chopra, a…

(Pictured: Paul McNamara)  Currency movements over the past two years took the shine off emerging market bonds, but this is unlikely to continue, according to Paul McNamara, investment director of GAM International. As a provider of yield, emerging market bonds are in a better position in the world of sovereigns. “There were some big currency…

(Pictured: Iain Dunstan) While the past few years have basically been a nightmare for financial planners due to regulatory uncertainty compounding the yield-producing challenge facing a big proportion of their client base, perhaps dawn has broken. The latest study by Business Health in association with Rubik Financial, has some interesting findings. The study, involving a cross-section…

Hedge funds had their best year for inflows globally in 2014 since 2007 when the wheels started to fall off alternative investing as an asset grouping. But net redemptions in the month of December took the shine off the results. According to the latest quarterly hedge fund report from data provider eVestment, the total inflow…

(Pictured: Michael Armitage)  The largest US pension fund, CalPERS, turned its back on hedge funds in a much-publicised decision last year. Michael Armitage, of consulting firm Milliman, considers the implications for Australian investors. He says the decision by the largest US pension fund to scrap its $US4 billion hedge fund program should prompt Australians to…