News

Frontier Advisors expects to release its new information technology platform tools for clients, known as ‘Partners Platform 2.0’, later this year, the asset consulting firm said in its annual review for clients published last week. Andrew Polson, Frontier’s chief executive, said: “We realised the role technology can play in an institutional advice model many years…

An analysis of consequences of the European restrictions on broker commissions from fund managers, under MiFID II, has led to some interesting work on what constitutes an optimum size and structure of an investment team. The results are equally applicable to big super funds and other institutional investors. A recent international shares sector report by…

Fee wars intensified in the US exchange-traded fund (ETF) market last year squeezing down investor costs to record lows in all product varieties, a new FactSet analysis reveals. Having arguably started the fees war, ETFs are now also getting squeezed alongside active managers. The FactSet study found about a third of all US-listed ETFs cut…

ESG is a big and complex subject which institutional investors still struggle with. Their hearts may be in the right place but subjecting their beliefs to fiduciary investment rigour is a different story. Mans Carlsson-Sweeny has spent the past 13 years analysing all aspects of ESG. His latest passion is plastics. Ausbil Investment Management last…

Admittedly, he has a bit of a bee in his bonnet over this subject, but former fund manager, asset consultant and current advisor and researcher John Peterson, mounts a compelling case for active management. He can also show that active manager performance has been persistent. In his latest client note, published last week, John Peterson,…

Crestone Wealth Management is shaping up as the new blueprint for wealth managers in a post Royal Commission world. Not only have its funds under management increased, at an increasing rate, in the past three years, but the firm has also attracted more advisors into its fold at a time when advisors are moving away…

The ASX-listed Xplore investment platform business, formerly known as ‘managedaccounts.com’, has reconfigured its asset servicing arrangements after a review by MSI Group. J.P. Morgan is the big winner, but new FX and cash management efficiencies are likely to be replicated by other fiduciary investors. Patrick Liddy, MSI Group principal, and a former asset servicing executive…

David Travers, a former veteran of senior management in asset servicing who left RBC mid-way through last year, has made a career change by taking on the role of chief executive of a ‘regtech’ business, Fourth Line. He joins Tony McDonald, a serial financial services entrepreneur and Fourth Line chairman, alongside several other well-healed directors….

A group of academics at the Australian National University, including former asset consultant and investment industry executive Geoff Warren, has studied what should be the “right” amount for the compulsory Superannuation Guarantee. Like most aspects of super, they found the answer is not simple. The group – Geoff Warren, Gaurav Khemka and Yifu Tang –…

Up to 30 per cent of the newly established NZ Government Venture Capital Fund (VCF) could be allocated to “foreign” entities, rules included in the just-released policy statement confirm. Designed to bolster access to capital for promising NZ start-up companies, the NZ$300 million (A$280 million) VCF also has a mandate to support the local venture…

BlackRock signalled a new era for sustainable investing last week that big funds and their managers must catch up with. If you are investing almost US$7 trillion worldwide, you tend to get investors, governments and pretty much everyone’s attention. In letters to clients and industry leaders, BlackRock laid out a major shift to sustainable investing…

One of the tough things about being a publicly listed financial services firm is that every stock market announcement is studied by both shareholders and clients. The two have different agendas. State Street announced its global fourth quarter results last week and said it would focus on cost reduction in the coming year. That may…