Latest from IPE Magazine – Page 532
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Features
An awkward customer
In a world of increasing demand for investment solutions based around liability driven benchmarks, how do global bond portfolios fit in? Historically, as Paul Abberley, head of fixed income at ABN AMRO Asset Management points out, “global bonds have always been problematic as an asset class in an optimisation framework. ...
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Features
Why convergence is taking place
There are an increasing number of similarities between the strategies used by managers of alternative investments and those employed by private equity managers. Alternative investment assets under management are estimated at one trillion dollars and spread over 8,000 funds, while the private equity industry manages only $150bn (e124bn), distributed among ...
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Features
Germany plans inflation-linked bond issue
German pension funds have been reflecting on the news that Germany plans to issue its first-ever inflation-linked bonds in the near future. The government’s treasurer, Finanzagentur, has confirmed the plans. It did not say when the bonds would be sold, only that the government had empowered it to do so ...
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Features
UK schemes scramble to buy linkers
The Bank of England says UK pension funds are buying index-linked gilts at virtually any price – caught in a vicious circle of falling yields and falling funding ratios. The central bank said demand for index-linked gilts from UK schemes “may have become relatively price inelastic” due to the shift ...
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Features
Unilever sets up €5bn asset pooling
Consumer products group Unilever has set up a pension asset pooling vehicle called Univest which could grow to around €3-5bn in size. The firm said Univest was expected to reduce risk and enhance net return potential. It would provide a “diversified external manager” facility for Unilever schemes worldwide. Unilever’s Dutch ...
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Features
Bostanci wins IPE scholarship
The 2005/6 IPE/AIMSE Scholarship has gone to Sibel Bostanci, head of institutional sales at investment management firm Delta Lloyd in Germany. Wiesbaden-based Bostanci will be attending the AIMSE/Wharton Investment Institute at the Wharton Business School, University of Pennsylvania. The one-week programme is designed to boost sales managers’ marketing and financial ...
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Features
A rose by any other name...
What’s in a name? The search for a new term for ‘pensions’ that might be less off-putting for scheme members is an endeavour without real appeal to those managing pension plans. The predicament is one of coming up with something that is much worse than what we have or that ...
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Features
The great bond shortage?
IPE asked three pension funds in three countries – the Netherlands, the UK and Switzerland: ‘Does the scarcity of high-quality long-term government bonds highlighted by the OECD, pose a problem?’ Here are their answers: Peter Scales, chief executive of the London Pensions Fund Authority, which has AUM of £3.2bn ...
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Features
Gearing up for global note
Four European institutions have launched an awareness campaign to prepare issuers and their agents for a new legal and holding structure for international debt securities, to be launched in June. The changeover to the new structure is being driven by EU monetary policy. The New Global Note (NGN) is a ...
