All Features articles – Page 159
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Features
Assessing the strategy
What is fuelling the rash of 130/30 products? And are they a legitimate relaxation of unnecessary constraints or a pernicious hybrid that combines the worst aspects of long-only managers’ asset-gathering philosophy and hedge fund-style fees? Joseph Mariathasan examines the drivers and drawbacks of 130/30 strategies
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Bedding in reforms
Pirkko Juntunen finds that the implementation of the Puro Commission proposals has resulted in increased equity allocation
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Features
Tectonic plates begin to shift
The movement towards funded vehicles is picking up in pace, finds Nina Roehrbein
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Features
Implementation risk and the benefits of quant
In the June edition of IPA, we assessed the so-called 130/30 strategy in the context of risk budgeting. Azim Alvi takes the discussion forward by explaining some of the practical consequences
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Features
Home bias pays off
Despite last year’s outperformance, Pirkko Juntunen detects concerns that the size of the local markets makes them vulnerable
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Revaluation boosts real estate
Strong small-caps performance lead a domestic equity rally, finds Pirkko Juntunen
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Features
The prime broker view
Current market volatility may delay the arrival of some, but 130/30 funds are definitely on their way. Prime brokers and fund administrators are readying themselves for when the time comes, writes Lynn Strongin Dodds
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Features
Taking stock of a buoyant market
Barbara Ottawa finds that even a market fall has not deterred Pensionskassen from moving away from bonds and further into equities
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Features
Fed’s rate cut buoys markets and steepens curve
Yield curve/duration lthough neither the ECB nor the Bank of England (BoE) raised rates at the start of September, the US Federal Reserve (Fed) did step in to cut rates. While the US forward markets had over the summer already moved to discount an early autumn rate cut, the size ...
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Features
Enhanced cash and the naming problem
The choice of cash funds is growing rapidly, but assessing them is not always easy because the categorisation has not been standardised, says Jonathan Curry
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Features
Changing the portfolio
Irish pension funds are moving out of equities but are not yet ready for bonds, according to Shayla Walmsley
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Features
Choice set to narrow as custodians merge
Has the recent spate of mergers in the global custody industry changed anything for custody clients? Ross Whitehill, chief operating officer at Thomas Murray, a London-based custody and capital market infrastructure ratings company, says yes. Clients have less choice each time there is M&A activity, he says, although it is ...
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Features
What makes good communication?
IPE asked three pension services – in Bulgaria, the Netherlands and Spain – the same question: ‘How and what do you communicate with your members?’ Here are their answers:
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Features
Holding up in the face of competition
Luxembourg overhauled its law on specialist investment funds in February this year, presenting competition for German Spezialfonds.Luxembourg SIFs are less regulated than their German cousins, but it remains to be seen to what extent they will attract the interest of German investors. The year 2006 saw a reduction in the numbers of Spezialfonds-KAGs. But growth in Spezialfonds assets was still in double digits even if this was less than 2005. Till Entzian presents his annual survey of the market
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Features
A consultant evolution
Consolidation in Germany’s actuarial and investment consulting market continues apace, notably with Watson Wyatt’s acquisition of the big hitter Heissmann. Pirkko Juntunen reports
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Features
Creating space for innovation
Despite having to cope with regulatory tribulations, pension funds were unfazed and clocked up healthy returns, Carolyn Bandel writes
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Features
The dollar is our currency, but it’s your problem
The words of Nixon-era US treasury secretary John Connally are developing new resonance for Asian central bankers
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Features
The great debate
Quant or fundamental? Which type of manager has the right stuff to manage 130/30 strategies? Lynn Strongin Dodds examines the pros and cons
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Features
Dipping a toe into diversification
Recent changes are broadening the horizons of traditionally conservative managers, George Coats finds
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Features
Taking the downs with the ups
As the waves of the US sub-prime lending crisis lap on Europe’s shores, how worried should Europe’s pension funds be? The credit crunch has affected banks and institutions that borrow on the capital markets, as liquidity has dried up. But how has this affected Europe’s pension schemes and their investments? The evidence is that pension funds are prepared to ride out market volatility without any significant change of course.
