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(pictured: Russell Clarke) Mercer chief investment officer Russell Clarke has thrown his weight behind the growing criticism of Australia’s fee obsession. Fees are driving investment decisions and that’s not in the best interests of the end investor, he says. Clarke participated last week in a webinar organised by researcher Stewart Oldfield of Field Research. Clarke said…

(pictured: Patrick Farrell)  Pat Farrell, the former chief investment officer at BT Financial Group, who left that firm in May, will become the new chief investment officer at Suncorp, following the retirement last month of Nick Basile. The appointment is expected to be announced this week. The role, based in Sydney, oversees the mostly outsourced…

(pictured: Eusebio Teofilo-Sanchez) Securities lending, which was dealt a blow during the global financial crisis as a lot of lenders withdrew from the market, is making a comeback. Investors are adapting to the likely continuation of a low-return environment. According to Eusebio Teofilo-Sanchez, Citi’s regional head of securities lending, the increasing sophistication of super funds and…

(pictured: Brett Baker) Evergreen Consultants, the boutique asset consultant for financial planners and family offices launched early this year by Angela Ashton and Brett Baker, has finalised its asset allocation committee. The members are: Angela Ashton, Tom Cottam, Stephen Duchesne, Kingsley Jones and Daniel Liptak. Baker said last week: “We’ve spent a few months talking and…

(pictured: Lochiel Crafter) The need to boost investment performance in a low return and volatile market environment is fuelling interest from investors in new strategies which are reshaping traditional active equities management, according to State Street Global Advisors. And a key trend is downside protection. Lochiel Crafter, SSGA’s Sydney-based head of Asia Pacific, says: “In this…

(pictured: Rob Everett) Policing robo-advice is a global challenge that was unlikely to be solved by waging “algorithm wars”, according to Financial Markets Authority (FMA) chief, Rob Everett. With the NZ financial regulator poised to take on the robo-cop role under new Financial Adviser Act (FAA) reforms released last week, Everett said the FMA was developing…

(pictured: David Klinger)  As liquidity in the Australian share market continues to drop and algorithmic trading has splintered institutional activity into tiny parcels, the challenge for big super funds to get in and out of domestic stocks is getting worse. Institutional flows into Australia have plummeted. Against this backdrop, a group of former traders has…

(pictured: Grahame Evans) DomaCom, the innovative property fund manager, which recently hit the headlines through a crowd-funding plan to buy the famous Kidman agricultural holdings, is looking to raise at least $10 million through an IPO for its own business. DomaCom has lodged its prospectus with ASIC and the offer has been underwritten for about half of the…

(pictured: Patrick Colle) BNP Paribas Securities Services (BNP) has rolled out a responsible investment tool, tapping into a burgeoning demand for the service from global institutional investors. The new ESG (environmental, social and governance) Risk Analytics system analyses up to 750 data points for every company in its database, BNP said in a release last week….

(pictured: Graham Harman) Russell Investments has adopted an after-Brexit stay-in-bed policy, according to the group’s latest quarterly market outlook.  Russell cautions investors against buying into the recent Brexit-related dip in markets, given the over-arching fundamentals globally. The Russell report says share prices would have to experience “substantial moves” up or down before the global multi-manager executed…

(pictured: David Orford) Financial Synergy, arguably the leading superannuation systems company in Australia, is for sale. David Orford, who founded the firm in Melbourne in 1978 as an actuarial business, has appointed an investment bank to advise on a possible transaction. While, in theory, the possible sale of Financial Synergy should not impact on the proposed…

(pictured: Gerald Stack) by David Chaplin Listed infrastructure is currently trading at a 15-30 per cent discount to comparable unlisted assets, according to Magellan global head of infrastructure, Gerald Stack. It’s suffering from too much money but there is a disconnect between listed and unlisted assets. Stack said that while academic theory suggests listed infrastructure should…