News

(Pictured: Leeanne Turner) by Greg Bright Leeanne Turner, chief executive of the Motor Trades Association of Australia Superannuation Fund (MTAA Super), has won the 2014 Fund Executive of the Year award. While she doesn’t like to dwell on the past, the award recognizes a significant feat in turning around a fund which had previously been beset…

(Pictured: Andrew McGill) by Penny Pryor A chance encounter in London last year and a subsequent meeting of the minds has led to an alliance that will form one of the largest independent boutique incubator, or multi-affiliate, firms in the world. Treasury Group is to merge with Northern Lights Capital Group. Treasury Group shareholders will come…

(Pictured: Richard Keary) by Penny Pryor Commodities might be going through a rough spell, but with inflationary pressures increasing, investments that can act as a hedge, such as commodities, could be about to experience an upswing. An Australian-owned European manager thinks so. “Once the asset class actually picks up and produces some decent returns we are…

by Brendan Swift The $4 billion-plus Maritime Super has appointed Avoca Investment Management to oversee a small-cap mandate after the closure of Kosmos Asset Management earlier this year. Maritime first awarded a small caps mandate to Kosmos in 2009-10 however, the closure of the funds management firm this year forced the super fund to appoint…

(Pictured: Iain Perry) Iain Perry, a former research analyst at Perpetual Investments, has been appointed head of performance analytics and investment risk at Ibbotson Associates, part of the expanding Morningstar investment management division. Perry will be managing the daily allocation process for Ibbotson’s diversified portfolios, which total about $5 billion for Australian clients, reporting to chief…

(Pictured: John Brogden) The best speeches of politicians are often their last. They can afford to be reflective and, even, honest. John Brogden, the former NSW Liberal Party Leader, delivered his fifth and final speech to the Financial Services Council conference last Thursday, before his departure from the CEO role next January. In the speech,…

(Pictured: Peter Jordan) Northern Trust has expanded its Melbourne-based fund services role through the promotion of Peter Jordan to head up Asia Pacific, following the return of Camie West, the well-known Hong Kong-based executive, to Chicago head office. Jordan was appointed head of Australia and New Zealand for Northern’s global fund services unit earlier this year,…

Alternative investments will continue to represent the fastest-growing segment of the asset management industry worldwide, according to a report by McKinsey & Co published last week. The report, based on a survey of 300 institutional investors, expects alternatives to provide 40 per cent of the industry’s revenue but this will be generated from only 15…

(Pictured: Les Fallick and John Brakey) After gradually reducing his workload in recent years, Les Fallick, founder of Principle Advisory Services, has made his final break with the firm. This has coincided, though, with the recruitment of John Brakey, another experienced private equity manager. Ken Licence, Principle’s managing director and major shareholder, noted that Fallick, an…

(Pictured: Jennifer Bridwell) PIMCO’s alternatives area tends to fly under the radar compared with the bulk of the firm’s fixed interest business, but since 2008 it has become very active through a range of opportunistic debt-orientated strategies which have taken advantage of distressed situations. The world’s largest bond manager now has about US$25 billion in alternatives….

(Pictured: Cory Martin) BNP Paribas Investment Partners is offering Australian investors new access to a global value investor which is happy to be known as ‘the biggest fund manager you’ve never heard of’. Barrow, Hanley, Mewhinney & Strauss (BHMS) is a US$100 billion affiliate of Old Mutual which hails from Dallas, Texas. In Australia to promote…

(pictured: Rhys Octigan) The introduction of quarterly reporting of MySuper fund options by APRA from this month may bring with it some unwelcome trends. Fund managers need to be prepared to have their numbers discussed on talk-back radio, for example. But managers and super funds can also take advantage of the extra data they are now…