Latest from IPE Magazine – Page 361
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Special Report
Forests into fixed income
Despite being relatively new to the fixed income market, green bonds offer responsible investors a good opportunity to invest sustainably. Nina Röhrbein reports
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Interviews
Strategic agility
Nordic private equity house CapMan does not make things easy on itself. Its mission statement: “To be the best-performing European private equity firm”.
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Interviews
New entrant to European fiduciary management
Here in Europe, the joke says that British Airways is a pension scheme that owns a few planes. The US equivalent claims that General Motors is a social security fund with a sideline in building Buicks.
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Features
Diary of an Investor: Investment detour
This autumn, we at Wasserdicht Pension Funds in the Netherlands are touring some of our factories around the country to talk to members and pensioners about the pension fund.
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Opinion Pieces
IORP under pressure
The European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority’s (EIOPA) call for advice on the subject of revisions to the EU’s 2003 IORP Directive on work-place-based pensions closes on 2 January 2012. It seeks advice on the extent to which the legislative framework should be similar to that for other financial institutions and products.
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Opinion Pieces
Investing for impact
“When traditional investors look at impact investing they sometimes think they have to sacrifice returns. Fortunately, there are many examples of impact investing that lead to both competitive returns and positive social impact. In fact, it can be a very competitive field of investing activities versus mainstream assets,” says Scott Budde, head of the global social and community investing department at TIAA-CREF. This is why TIAA-CREF, with $440bn (€319bn) assets, has been involved in impact investing since 2006, and socially responsible investing since the 1980s.
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Features
Pension anger
Even if they can’t easily articulate what single thing could be done to make them go home, the Wall Street protestors and their European counterparts have more than a little in common with the Dutch youth political activists who last month joined forces in a ‘pensions rebellion’ against the Netherlands’ ...
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Features
The ethical oligarchs
Kicking off the National Ethical Investment Week in London, pollster YouGov published the results of a survey measuring the British public’s interest in green and ethical financial products.
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Features
The long-termists
As those who watched the 2006 film ‘300’ will remember, ‘the 300’ refers to the band of Spartans who heroically fought against the Persians at the battle of Thermopylae in 480BC. A modern re-incarnation – The 300 Club – has been brought to life by Saker Nusseibeh, CIO of Hermes ...
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Features
UK pension funds judge buyouts as too costly
This summer’s market turbulence took many UK pension funds by surprise, pushing them to look even more closely at their de-risking strategy. But while pension buyout deal prices have remained fairly stable, the cost of such deals has increased significantly due to falls in bond yields.
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Opinion Pieces
Long-term Matters: Musical chairs
In recent years, environmental, social and governance (ESG) teams have tried to get closer -– both intellectually and in seating arrangements – to the company’s active equity portfolio managers. And for good reason: these were the company’s stars. All this led, quite naturally, to a heavy focus on ESG alpha. ...
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Features
Smart Finnish moves
Brendan Maton spoke with Staffan Sevón, chief investment officer at Veritas, about his fund’s hands-on approach to investing
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Country Report
The Nordic Region: Guarantees Too much of a good thing
Guaranteed pensions products in Denmark and Sweden for a long time looked too good to be true and perhaps they are. At least, they are too expensive for the providers to retain, which has led to various strategies – either closing the products for new investors or persuading people to ...
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Country Report
The Nordic Region: ‘Luckily, we don’t have Solvency II’
Martin Steward spoke to pension insurer Varma about how it manages its solvency levels and the impact Solvency II-style rules would have
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Country Report
The Nordic Region: Fees under scrutiny
Rachel Fixsen assesses Danish pension funds’ transparency about costs and fees
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Country Report
The Nordic Region: Nordic investors take a cautious line
Henrik Hoffmann-Fischer outlines key findings on asset allocation, as well as trends on global versus regional mandates, based on the sixth Nordic Investor Survey
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Asset Class Reports
Global Equities: Maintain concentration
Perhaps surprisingly, Joseph Mariathasan finds that well-managed active risk has paid off for global equity funds over recent years
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Asset Class Reports
Global Equities: An information edge
Few still believe that equity markets are efficient. But no-one thinks they are that inefficient, either. Martin Steward speaks to four asset managers who believe they have a proprietary information edge over the run-of-the-mill research process. Two exploit the wisdom of individuals; and two the wisdom of crowds
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Asset Class Reports
Global Equities: Harvesting risk premia
Dimitris Melas notes that institutional investors focus more on the selection of active managers than on the selection and combination of risk premia, despite growing evidence that risk premia contribute more to the long-term performance
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Asset Class Reports
Global Equities: A different animal?
Edward Mott explores the role of private equity and venture capital in post-recession equity portfolio optimisation
