Analysis

comment by Greg Bright There’s a reason that the big APRA-regulated super funds didn’t get hauled over the coals by the banking royal commission. They didn’t have anything to hide. The profit-for-member funds were unscathed compared with banks, quasi banks and bank-tainted commercial funds which had embedded financial advice. The super fund sector has been…

The world’s largest fund managers last week shone a spotlight on the difficulties the industry faced as two of them reported their second-quarter earnings results to US brokers and investors. Both BlackRock and State Street suffered further revenue declines in fee revenues. But BlackRock chief executive, Larry Fink, and State’s Street’s Ron O’Hanley were upbeat…

ASX-listed exchange-traded funds and exchange-traded products, such as actively managed listed funds, have become a phenomenon in the past few years, after a slow start. The latest rankings show that smaller organisations are competing well against the world’s largest fund managers. BetaShares, one of those smaller organisations, has observed in its latest industry-wide report, for…

The European alternative assets market is thriving despite a general air of gloom descending on the increasingly fractured continent, according to a new report from global hedge fund research house Preqin. Mark O’Hare, Preqin founder and chief executive, says in the report that “economic growth is not the same thing as activity and opportunities in…

Investors have long worried about ‘bubbles’ and ‘busts’. But there are also stocks which could be termed ‘anti bubble’. In its latest client note, Research Affiliates, the US-based smart-beta specialist, which opened an office in Melbourne last year, the authors, including the firm’s famous founder, Rob Arnott, define the landscape. In the current environment, after…

by Greg Bright The news that Statewide Super exited a three-way merger with Tasplan and WA Super and Tasplan immediately announced talks with MTAA Super, followed by Hostplus disclosing it was talking to Club Super, are just part of the big and blurry picture. How about this for a rumour: REST Super and Sunsuper? The…

by Greg Bright Artificial Intelligence is coming to the investment world sooner than you think. Vontobel Asset Management, the big Zurich-based global manager, now has a product in beta-testing mode, where its investment committee decisions are based on AI. In fact, the committee members are all avatars. And its returns are top decile. Daniel Seiler,…

by David Chaplin External fund managers barely get a look in on the US$37.8 trillion held by large government-owned investors globally, a new report found. According to the ‘Global Public Investor 2019’ study, almost 70 per cent of the institutions captured by the survey allocate between only zero and10 per cent to external managers. The…

A study by the Economist newspaper’s ‘Intelligence Unit’ on asset owners’ priorities in the ESG space has shown that, within the largest cohort of the top 100 asset owners, in Asia, there has been a significant increase in awareness of ESG issues over the past few years. The Asian-based big global investors, perhaps surprisingly, are…

While presenting a generally upbeat outlook for its continued expansion globally, Link Group addressed brokers and investors in London last week on the issue of its regulatory issue regarding the failure of one of its glamour clients, the Woodford Global Equity Income Fund. In his presentation, John McMurtrie, the global chief executive, said that Link…

Institutional investors tend to be sceptical of the benefits of ETFs. ETFs have a wide spread, which can challenge an investor’s position. But increasingly they are being used for tactical purposes. BetaShares is setting the pace with new ETF offerings. Martin Currie Investment Management is the latest in the new BetaShares list, totalling 53 ETFs….

Australian institutional investors redeemed about US$1.7 billion from their equity managers in the March quarter, erasing the US$1.6 billion they had invested in the December quarter. The latest redemptions were the same as for the whole of Europe in the same period. The latest data from eVestment, the global investment performance research firm, show that…