The institution seeks a greater role for Miria Asset Management, its own asset management company, as it reviews the strategic asset allocation
Fondazione Enasarco, the €9.3bn Italian first-pillar pension fund for sales representatives, is approaching other first-pillar pension schemes as it seeks to expand the role of its asset management company, Miria Asset Management, while at the same time carrying out a review of its strategic asset allocation.
Italy’s first pillar schemes for professionals, known as casse di previdenza, collectively hold around €115bn of assets. According to local reports, Enasarco has approached a number of those schemes to establish whether Miria Asset Management can provide investment services to them.
In-depth talks have yet to begin, because some of the schemes involved are in the midst of changing or renewing their management teams. Enasarco itself is undergoing a senior manageent reshuffle.
Adepp, the association representing casse di previdenza, is said to be willing to participate in the talks, according to local sources.
Enasarco acquired the Luxembourg-based asset management company, previously called GWM Holding, in 2023. Today, Enasarco plans to turn the company into an operational platform for the country’s largest institutional investors. The aim is to increase the size of assets to be invested primarily in Italy’s domestic economy, and to cut asset management fees, according to a news report in the Milano Finanza newspaper.
Unlike Enasarco, Italy’s first pillar pension funds rely on external asset management companies, or manage portfolios internally.
CDP Venture Capital, the VC arm of the state-owned investment bank Cassa Depositi e Prestiti, has rebuffed an invite to cooperate with Miria, according to Milano Finanza.
Enasarco and Adepp did not reply to a request for comment.
Streamlining investments
Enasarco is carving a new role for its asset management company, which will help Enasarco adapt more efficiently to the new market dynamics, which require timely actions to seize opportunities and maximise returns, the scheme wrote in the 2024 financial statement.
The organisation is creating synergies with Miria, creating a specific mandate for direct investment in equities, to make the management of liquid assets more flexible and appropriate to the characteristics of the asset class, it added in the financial statement.
Miria will manage a dedicated fund for allocations to European equities to make investment “more effective,” it added.
Enasarco took over Miria to cut asset management costs, particularly with regard to its large portfolio of real estate, which is worth €2.6bn.
The scheme has begun to cut exposure to the asset class, while shifting towards other types of domestic real assets and towards Italian government bonds, which are now worth close to €1bn in the portfolio, said chief financial officer Carolina Farina during the pension fund’s general meeting in April.
The new role for the asset management company is closely linked to the new strategic asset allocation drafted by Enasarco.
With the new strategy, Enasarco has separated out the Employee Termination Benefit Fund (FIRR), which holds €2.65bn assets, and the provident fund (Fondo di Previdenza), with the latter being managed according to a liability-driven investment strategy, the statement said.
The FIRR fund targets an allocation of 7.4% to cash, while 52.5% is invested in bonds, 15% in equities, 11% in alternatives and 14% in real estate. The provident fund targets 70% of the assets invested in bonds, 20% in alternatives and 10% in real estate, according to the new strategy.
Read the digital edition of IPE’s latest magazine
