News

Overseas, Australia’s biggest super fund is a small fish in a massive pond. To achieve the scale it wants it will have to dive deeper into the private markets, meeting stiff competition from its North American peers along the way.

Shame-based investment strategies yoked to simplistic environmental, social and governance (ESG) scoring systems have come under fire in a new report from UK data analytics firm, Util.

If negative screening worked, stocks in the sin bin should have lower firm valuations, higher future stock returns, and delist more often. They don’t.

“If you don’t know where you are in a bear market, then you should be in the game… We get asked: ‘is it too late?’ Our view is that it’s never too late to think about defensive strategies.”

“The industry should not be happy to simply sit somewhere in the middle… Increased transparency will drive increased analysis and action. If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it.”

It turns out that being a top performer can be tough as institutional clients pull money from favourites amidst broader equity de-risking.

“If you have style drift and you move into the latest hot thing, you’re gonna get whipsawed… That’s usually the death knell of a fund manager, that style drift.”

The spectre of early release still looms large over the industry, and super’s true believers want its purpose legislated to prevent Australia’s retirement savings from becoming a crisis piggy bank.

Allocations to unlisted property, diversified fixed interest, Australian and international shares had the greatest impact on whether an option passed the test or not.

Dotted with various government funds, the Pacific Islands has emerged as a competitive space for NZ and Australian-based investment advisers.

Chicago-based V-Square Quantitative Management has expanded its separately-managed account platform with the launch of its Global Equity ESG Materiality and Carbon Transition Indexed Strategy.

Consolidation among superannuation clients is changing the nature of Citi’s business with them, and increased appetite for nation-building in Australia means plenty of opportunities in private markets.