NETHERLANDS - The Swiss hedge fund and asset manager EIM Group, specialists in absolute return portfolios, has opened a separate office in Amsterdam, IPE has learned today.

The new office will be headed by Jurcell Virginia, who has been involved in launching for EIM an absolute return portfolio for the €860m pension fund of the Dutch construction group Volker Wessels in April last year.

Volker Wessels adopted a new investment approach in 2006 to reduce short-term overall risk levels via liability matching, while aiming for a strict annual return target through a diversified absolute return portfolio, managed by EIM.

According to the firm, EIM manages a number of significant mandates for leading Dutch pension funds. With the opening of the new office, the company  aims to build on that.

EIM has a total of $14.5trn in assets under management. The Dutch office is EIM's ninth.

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