News

State Street has recruited a 22-year Deutsche Bank veteran, Jeslyn Tan, to fill the position as head of product management, driving the end-to-end product strategy in the Asia Pacific region. The Singapore-based role was previously filled by Babloo Sarin, who has become head of ‘asset owner and official institution’ segments for State Street in the…

Aon has put its KiwiSaver and employer master trust schemes on the block, according to industry sources. It is understood Aon has circulated an investment memorandum seeking interest in the group’s two schemes, which collectively manage about $920 million split between the $730 million KiwiSaver and $190 million master trust. The move represents the first…

Record asset prices in major markets over the past six months have helped Australia’s asset servicing firms to a record level of assets under custody, rising to $4.4 trillion at the end of June. The latest figures from the Australian Custodial Services Association, published last Friday (August 6), show J.P. Morgan consolidating its number one…

bfinance has recruited its first senior executive dedicated to ESG, coinciding with a commitment to net zero carbon emissions by 2050 across its business, including manager searches. The global funds management search and research advisory firm has appointed Sarita Gosrani as ESG and responsible investment director. She heads up the new ESG advisory unit based…

The increasingly expansionary MSCI Group is to buy Real Capital Analytics (RCA), a property research firm. The Australian operation is earmarked for strong growth. MSCI announced last week (August 3) that it would pay US$950 million (A$1.3 billion) for RCA, which was founded in the US a little over 20 years ago, in 2000, by…

The Standing Committee on Economics is launching a new inquiry into big super. Not everybody is happy about it. Compulsory viewing for many professionals and reporters, the Standing Committee on Economics is infamous for its hardball interrogations of Australia’s biggest institutional investors, and the announcement of a new inquiry will likely have some stakeholders tearing…

Aon will pay a US$1 billion break fee to Willis Towers Watson after a proposed marriage between the two global insurance broking and professional services firms fell over last week due to US regulatory problems. In a joint statement (July 27), Aon and Willis Towers Watson (WTW) blamed the end of their 16-month engagement on…

Bryan Gray, who retired from full-time work this year after a distinguished career in asset servicing, has taken on a role as ‘brand ambassador’ at Goal Group in Australia. The new part-time role involves working with Goal’s clients and prospects on their use of the firm’s technology services behind class action monitoring, filing and recoveries…

Gold has intrigued investors for almost as long as its existence, first as a store of wealth and currency and now as, well, what? Frontier, has taken a look at gold’s worth to professional investors. And it’s not about an inflation hedge. Frontier’s Chris Trevillyan, director of investment strategy, and Nicholas Thomas, senior consultant, have…

An Australian super fund has seeded a boutique emerging market debt (EMD) fund as instos look overseas for yield. But challenges for the asset class abound. As Argentina approached its presidential primaries in August 2019, the team at EMD boutique Finisterre grew wary. The primaries would take place during a low liquidity month; they were…

With the advent of Your Future Your Super (YFYS) Australia’s super funds are more closely examining their indexing options. The trick is ensuring member outcomes don’t suffer. Benchmark-relative risk is now top of mind for super funds, with specialist implementation manager Parametric seeing a substantial uptick in the number of funds taking an interest in…

The collapse of an investee company has seen IFM hauled before the standing committee on economics. The bigger issue is how a fund manager keeps commercial matters confidential in Parliament. The hot topic at Thursday’s (29 July) hearing of the standing committee on economics was Tandem, a workplace contractor and IFM investee that has now…