News

(Pictured: Kevin Clifford) by Greg Bright Capital Group has set some ambitious business targets for its Australian and regional offices over the next five years. With the help of about US$1 billion in expansionary spending, Kevin Clifford, who is in charge of international distribution, wants Asia Pacific and Europe to each more than double their assets…

(Pictured: Ian Perkins) BNP Paribas Securities Services has won its biggest super fund client, the $50 billion UniSuper, in what is a “unique time for activity” for the asset servicing sector. More is to come with a record value of tenders having hit or about to hit the market. The BNP Paribas deal announced last week…

(Pictured: Peter Tiffin) Fulcrum Asset Management has confirmed its second Australian client for its global diversified absolute return strategy following the $80 million announced in 2012 in a separate product for an industry fund. The manager is heavily research oriented, including the use of “nowcasting” as a tool to better interpret various leading indicators and signals….

(Pictured: Ron Bird) Professional investors may mock the stock selection of SMSF trustees for lack of diversity and heavy weighting to the banks, but a new study shows that such a strategy may well perform better than that of fund managers, both domestic and international. The study, by Peter Swan and others at the University of…

(Pictured: Steve Kuhn) The annual AIMA Australia Hedge Fund Forum, to be held at the Sofitel Sydney Wentworth on September 15 this year, will feature Steve Kuhn, partner and co-CIO at Pine River Capital Management, as a keynote speaker. The Forum, which last year had nearly 300 attendees, is the major conference for alternative strategies –…

(Pictured: Steve Miller) The headwinds to growth in Australia are more challenging than most people think, according to Steve Miller of BlackRock, who presented the firm’s latest global markets outlook last week. It’s a sombre view of the world. Miller, investment strategist for BlackRock Australia, who has a long pedigree as a fixed income manager, said…

by David Chaplin The Financial Markets Authority (FMA) has contacted local subsidiaries of Australian banks in the wake of the most recent financial advice scandals to hit across the Tasman. According to Kirsty Campbell, FMA head of supervision, the regulator has been “having conversations” with Australian-owned NZ financial institutions following a string of high-profile investigations…

(Pictured: Tamar Hamlyn) Inflation-linked securities – CPI bonds – are likely to attract renewed interest because of the demographic shift happening in the super industry as it approaches the baby-boomers’ decumulation phase of their investment spans. Super funds should take note too. Tamar Hamlyn, a principal of fixed interest specialist Ardea Investment Management, has an interesting…

(Pictured: Steve Potter) After years of servicing Australia and New Zealand, successfully, with a fly-in/fly-out team, Northern Trust Asset Management has opened a three-person office in Melbourne under regional senior vice president for institutional business and strategy, Bert Rebelo, who will relocate from Hong Kong. Rebelo, who has been with Northern Trust for about 16 years…

(Pictured: Patrick Colle) BNP Paribas Securities Services has invested more in Australia, in terms of people and systems, than in any other country in the past few years, Patrick Colle, the Paris-based chief executive told a media briefing last week. The firm is now getting about half of all new business from outside Europe. Colle said…

(Pictured: Andrew Kleinig) TIAA-CREF, a US firm with which many Australian industry funds have had discussions over the years, has opened an Australian office and last week held two roundtables – one on ESG issues and the other on investing in ‘real’ assets. But it’s TIAA-CREF’s expertise in retirement services that may most interest Australian funds….

(Pictured: Jesper Bruun-Olsen) Algomi Ltd, the fintech start-up backed by Lakestar Venture Capital, has commenced marketing its fixed income information platform in Australia, following the opening of a Hong Kong office earlier this year. The platform is like a social media hub for bond sellers – usually banks – and big investors – either fund managers…