News

(Pictured: Ken Marshman) Ken Marshman, the chair of REST Super and former chief executive of JANA Investment Advisers, has spent a good part of his career looking for ways to reduce the costs associated with active investment management. He presented a six-point plan to the ASI conference. A few years ago, Marshman was the co-author, with…

(Pictured: Full of goodies) In a blast from conferences past, but with a stronger technological bias, all wrapped up in a tastefully and appropriately decorated bag, the organisers and sponsors of the Australian Superannuation and Investment conference warmed the hearts of attendees with their give-aways this year. After years of austerity in the promotions department,…

(Pictured: Tony McDonald) by Greg Bright There are big troubles facing the bank-aligned financial planning groups, from litigation to regulation to disenchantment by the clients and the planners themselves. Whether or not this leads to a more independent planning model, as some are predicting, is uncertain. Super funds can take advantage of the mess. Ironically, it…

(Pictured: Matthew Walker) The new Association of Real Return Investment Advisers (ARRIA) is targeting the “top 20 per cent” of IFAs as members, according to the inaugural chair, financial planner Matthew Walker, in order to provide practical content, tools and discussion opportunities to promote outcomes-oriented strategies in the advice community. Walker, a director of independent advisory…

(Pictured: Anne-Marie Corboy) One of Australia’s longest-serving industry fund chief executives, Anne-Marie Corboy, has announced her intention to step down from the $29 billion HESTA at the end of February next year. Having been appointed to her role in 1998, she said in a release last Friday, she was now hoping to develop a portfolio of…

(Pictured: Feifei Li) The rise in popularity of smart-beta since the global financial crisis has prompted a resurgence in debate about the various factors which quant managers use in devising their strategies. More importantly, whether the characters these factors exhibit are likely to persist. The low-volatility premium is particularly topical and is winning hearts and minds,…

(Pictured: Martin Goss) World rankings of institutional funds probably don’t mean much to the underlying investors and fund members but the data collection often exposes some interesting trends around the global pensions industry. Towers Watson’s annual Top 300 Funds report was released last week. In the latest Top 300, compiled by Towers Watson and ‘Pensions &…

(Pictured: Damien Hatfield) Damien Hatfield, one of the most influential hedge fund managers in Australia, and his partner David Louie, have joined multi-affiliate manager Ascalon Capital in a sales and marketing capacity. Hatfield, sometimes referred to as the godfather of the Australian hedge fund industry, and Louie, will retain their consulting business, Triple A Partners, in…

(Pictured: David Bone) Citi has introduced a service for super funds and managers to help them capitalize on the launch of the Shanghai-Hong Kong Stock Connect program, which will enable foreign investors to buy China ‘A’ shares without a QFII quota and for Chinese investors to more easily access foreign markets. The Stock Connect program, which…

Not only are active managers more likely to outperform their benchmarks in emerging markets, the outperformance is more likely to persist than for managers in the major asset classes, according to a study by Segal Rogerscasey. The study, published by the consulting firm’s Australian research partner Frontier Advisors, is part of a series which looks…

(Pictured: Geoff Lloyd) Perpetual has hit the growth phase of its management plan, confirming the establishment of a global equities team in the process of delivering, last week, its best profit performance for several years. The global equities team, as reported previously (ISN May 18, 2014), follows an incubation period of just over three years whereby…

(Pictured: Patrick Bolton) Do stock prices represent a good measure of a company’s fundamental value? Not according to professor Patrick Bolton of Columbia University. A good illustration of this is the market’s complete failure to price risks associated with climate change, he says. Professor Bolton is to address the annual Paul Woolley Centre conference at the…