All articles by David White – Page 11
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Features
Sorting the sheep from the goats
The Gothenburg-based Andra AP-fonden (AP2), one of the national ‘buffer’ funds of Sweden’s pension system, took the unusual step last year of terminating 16 of its domestic and European equity mandates at one stroke. This bold move was part of a strategic decision to draw a clearer distinction between the ...
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Features
Finding a niche idea
Few European asset managers can boast the pedigree of the Swiss investment manager Pictet Asset Management. Pictet is the affiliate of banking group Pictet & Cie, one of the oldest private banks in Switzerland and currently celebrating 200 years in the money management business. Age brings wisdom, and one of ...
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Features
Equities' Jekyll and Hyde
The Dutch asset management house Robeco last year announced that it was launching its first value fund, benchmarked to the MSCI World Value Index and investing solely in undervalued securities. The significance of this is that Robeco has a strong tradition of growth investing. Its Rolinco fund is a pure ...
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Features
Aligning assets with liabilities
Investment managers have been quicker than government to respond to the liability matching needs of UK pension funds. Before the UK government had announced plans for 50-year bonds, two leading European fund managers had rolled out solutions of their own. Both solutions tackle the shortage of suitable pooled liability matching ...
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Features
Paying for the good life
One of the requirements of membership of the Salvation Army, the quasi-military Christian mission created by William Booth in 1865, is that members abstain from alcohol and avoid tobacco. This has created an unusual situation for the actuaries of the Salvation Army’s UK pension schemes, who have to take account ...
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Features
Going global top down
European pension funds looking to invest in global equities may feel that they are limited to investment managers at the micro, stock-picking level, since equity markets at the macro, country and sector level are expected to converge. Payden & Rygel is challenging this assumption with the launch of a global ...
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Features
Portability begins at home
The lack of pension rights portability has been a long-running problem in Europe. Any switch from one pension scheme to another in a single country is likely to result in reduced pension rights. Moving across borders creates additional problems. Transfers may be complicated or even impossible, and benefits may be ...
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Features
Clwyd strikes the right risk/return balance
Clwyd Pension Fund, currently valued at £611m (e884m), is one of a growing number of local government pension funds in the UK that have made substantial allocations to alternative investments. Alternatives now represent 22% of the fund’s total portfolio. Of this 4% is allocated to currency funds, 4% to private ...
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Features
Infrastructure's class act
For pension funds the attraction of investing in infrastructure projects – roads bridges and airports – is that they can provide stable long-term returns and a good match for long-dated liabilities. However the drawback is that few pension funds have the expertise to assess the risk and returns of individual ...
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Features
Why absolute returns rule
In a bear market, investment managers pursuing relative returns strategies can offer their clients both good news and bad. The bad news is that they have lost money. The good news is that they have not lost as much money as everyone else. Managers implementing absolute return strategies, however, can ...
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Features
SSGA launches pooled fund liability matching for schemes
State Street Global Advisors has launched a flexible pooled vehicle, which lets schemes match future liabilities within different inflation environments. SSGA said its new ‘Pooled Asset Liability Matching Solution’ (PALMS) “enables pension funds to match their projected future liabilities within different inflation environments using a flexible and cost-effective pooled vehicle”. ...
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Features
NIB takes full ownership of FundPartners
NIB Capital, ABP and PGGM’s jointly owned merchant banking venture, is to acquire full ownership of its asset-structuring arm FundPartners. Hague-based NIB Capital currently owns 50.1% of FundPartners, which provides asset structuring and custody monitoring services to the Netherlands and Benelux pensions industry. NIB Capital bought a majority stake in ...
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Features
Working until you drop
The touchy subject of retirement age. Should people be compelled to retire at a certain age, and what age should that be? Many European states and employers impose official or mandatory retirement ages at which employees are expected to retire. However, these age limits were set at times when life ...
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Features
Smoothing over the differences
Since the beginning of this year all companies listed on stock exchanges within the EU have been required to prepare their consolidated financial statements in accordance with the new International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). Companies listed on exchanges outside the EU have a further year before the requirement applies to ...
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Features
Risk budgeting takes centre stage
How does ‘new balanced’ asset management work in practice? Allianz Global Investors’ (AGI) product Global Vision provides one example. Global Vision is the brainchild of Lee Thomas, a managing director of PIMCO and the head of its international portfolio. Thomas got the idea when PIMCO, 70% owned by Allianz, absorbed ...
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Features
New fashion balanced
The progressive move by pension funds from balanced to specialist management has been one of the dominant trends in the asset management industry over the past 10 years. The process, which began in the US, has extended to Europe and now seems irreversible. The main reason for the move is ...
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Features
From acorns to sturdy trees
The strategic development of AXA Investment Managers, the e340bn investment arm of the AXA Group, typifies the kind of move from balanced to specialist asset management that has gained momentum over the past decade. In 2003 AXA IM decided to re-focus its business on areas where it felt it had ...
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News
SSGA launches liability matching for schemes
EUROPE - State Street Global Advisors has launched a flexible pooled vehicle, which lets schemes match future liabilities within different inflation environments.
