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While most ESG strategies across the range of institutional, wholesale and retail investors remain active, over the past three years that has been rapid growth in passive ESG-influenced funds, both in their number and assets, according to Morningstar. Europe remains the biggest such market but the US, historically slow to adopt ESG funds, has grown…

When we speak of factors in the institutional investment world, we tend to think about equities investing. But fixed income and credit investing also have their factors. There are just not as many of them. Importantly, though, they can still be a “free lunch” for investors, according to Mellon’s Paul Benson. Benson is the head…

CheckRisk, the UK-based global risk manager and information provider, has taken the big step of offering financial institutions a once-only free risk appraisal of their banking counterparties. The firm, which helped clients through the GFC in 2008, believes most institutions and big investors were “blissfully unaware” of the nature of counterparty risks until then. Nick…

The climate finance investment gap is limiting the integration of climate change for companies and the financial sector across Asia, jeopardising the success of green finance globally, according to the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and Europe-based fund manager Amundi. The two groups plan to launch this week the ‘AIIB-Amundi Climate Change Investment Framework’, a tool aimed at helping with sustainable and responsible financing. The…

The Institute of Managed Account Professionals has announced the 2020 award winners across its seven categories. Unless you understand the dynamics of the managed accounts segment of the investment industry, the results may surprise. The main drivers of growth in managed accounts are the licensees and the multi-asset managers. The awards presentations were held, virtually,…

Metrics Credit Partners, just a sleepy institutional fund manager in the credit space a few years ago, celebrated its dramatic expansion in the retail sector last Thursday night (September 10). Having raised record sums for its LICs, including a raising which started early this year, the manager picked up the Fund Manager of the Year…

Fortnum Private Wealth, Count Financial and Link Advice – licensees in the wholesale financial advice space – will roll out Moneysoft’s digital ‘fact find’ service over coming months, as they move to automate the advice process. It’s all about improving efficiency in data management in the wholesale financial planner world. Advisors, at last, are getting…

Whoever’s fault it was – David Murray was probably too late to the battle to do anything constructive, assuming he would have tried, and the board was clearly moribund. The other senior management were possibly more concerned with their own positions than anything else. Whoever’s fault it was, the disaster that is AMP is reaching…

Murray Brewer finally departed T. Rowe Price last Friday (August 28), having established the global manager’s presence in Australia 14 years ago. His resignation period was a long one – first announced late last year. But now comes the good part: he will be holidaying as much as possible and then considering his options, at…

Capital Group has an interesting suggestion: why not turn the standard portfolio construction view for investors on its head? Why not reverse the traditional beta-heavy core and alpha-seeking satellites of the portfolios of most big super funds? The global manager believes that putting active strategies at the core provides more flexibility, and, ultimately, a better…

Rio Tinto, a global resources company which has both an Australian lineage and an Australian supply base, has started a war, perhaps unintentionally, with big super funds and a large proportion of the broader community following the company’s destruction of an ancient Aboriginal heritage site – the oldest known in Australia, dating back about 46,000…

A report by media research group the Nielsen Company following Australia-specific data collection shows there has been a significant spike in readership of business and finance news and commentary online, and also share-trading access to online investor tools, since the start of the lockdown in March. Readership of financial news and information has jumped 43…