Foto: Rachel Gardner. Cerrada la compra de Arden Asset Management por parte de Aberdeen
Aberdeen Asset Management acquired hedge fund solutions provider Arden Asset Management on December 31, 2015.
The combined hedge fund solutions team located in London and New York specializes in creating and managing multi-manager portfolios with expertise in hedge fund manager research, selection, monitoring/oversight and portfolio management. With $10.3 billion in assets under management, the team provides commingled funds, customized portfolios, mutual funds and advisory services to a global, blue-chip client base of individual and institutional investors.
This acquisition grows Aberdeen’s global alternatives platform, which encompasses multi-manager research, selection and portfolio management for hedge-fund strategies, private equity and debt, property and other real asset investments, along with direct investments in infrastructure projects. Aberdeen can now offer its clients access and exposure to a universe of high-quality alternative investments, covering liquid strategies, private markets and real assets.
Andrew McCaffery, Global Head of Alternatives at Aberdeen Asset Management, comments:”We are very pleased to have closed on the acquisition of Arden Asset Management LLC. Our excitement about the potential of the combined, integrated platform continues to grow, enhanced by the very encouraging feedback we have received from clients since signing the agreement. We continue to focus upon the opportunity presented by investors’ increasing demand for high-quality research, combined with effective portfolio construction and management, in an effort to generate sustainable returns for their hedge fund portfolios. The development of liquid-alternative portfolios and products, built off our broader hedge fund solutions platform, is an area that we are increasingly confident will grow in 2016 and beyond.”
It is anticipated that during the first quarter of 2016, Arden’s Alternative Strategies Fund and Arden’s Alternative Strategies II will be reorganized into newly created series of Aberdeen Funds, Aberdeen Multi-Manager Alternative Strategies Fund and Aberdeen Multi-Manager Alternative Strategies Fund II, using investment strategies that are substantially similar to those of the Arden Funds.
Aberdeen’s alternatives division has more than $21 billion of assets under management as of September 30, 2015. This coupled with Arden will bring the group’s alternatives assets to more than $31 billion. Aberdeen manages more than $429.7 billion on behalf of institutional and private investors.
CC-BY-SA-2.0, Flickr. Hans Vontobel muere con 100 años
Dr. Hans Vontobel, Honorary Chairman of Vontobel Holding AG, died on January 3rd 2016 at the age of 100. According to Vontobel’s statement “The employees of Vontobel are mourning an exceptional man, with whom they all felt a special bond.”
Hans Vontobel joined the then J. Vontobel & Co. in 1943, and under his leadership it became one of the leading internationally active investment advisory firms. He took over as Chairman of the Board of Directors in 1981, and had served as Honorary Chairman since 1991. For many years, he was the Chairman of the Zurich Stock Exchange, a member of the Board of Directors of the Swiss Bankers Association and the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, and Chairman of the German-Swiss Chamber of Commerce.
A father of two daughters and a son, he was not only a passionate banker, he was also an author and publicist. His credo “quand même” was immortalized in his his last Blog entry, He had an acute sense of civic awareness, and was a keen observer of his time. Hislife was greatly influenced by his love of nature, and by his commitment to a wide range of charitable causes. As a philanthropist he will be remembered, among other things, for having set up the Vontobel Foundation, the Kreatives Alter Foundation, and the Lyra Foundation, which supports highly gifted young musicians.
As a prudent and far-sighted entrepreneur, he soon put his stamp on the house and also addressed his own transience with the transfer of significant stakes to the Vontobel Foundation and the family-controlled Vontrust AG. “Ensuring that the company would remain independent after his death was a matter of great importance to him,” stated Vontobel.
Herbert J. Scheidt, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Vontobel Holding AG said: “Hans Vontobel was one of the most important bankers in our country, but beyond that he was a convinced humanist, who put people at the heart of everything he did. He will remain an example to us all, as a source of considered, far-sighted advice, and with his cosmopolitan outlook and thirst for knowledge. The Board of Directors, Group Executive Management and the employees will carry on his work and his values with a due sense of responsibility, resolve and commitment. All the employees send their heartfelt condolences to the family.”
WIN/Gallup International, the world’s leading association in market research and polling, has published its 39th End of Year Survey exploring the outlook, expectations, views and beliefs of 66,040 people from 68 countries across the globe. Below some of the most revealing findings:
66% of the world say that they feel happy about their lives, down from 70% in 2014; 23% are neither happy nor unhappy, and 10% feel unhappy about their lives
Net happiness (happy minus unhappy) globally is 56%
Colombia is the happiest country in the world (85% net happiness), followed by Fiji, Saudi Arabia, Azerbaijan and Vietnam while Iraq is the least happy for the second year in a row (-12% net happiness)
45% of the world is optimistic about the economic outlook for 2016; 22% are pessimistic and 28% believe the economy will remain the same
The most optimistic country about economic prosperity in 2016 is Nigeria (61% net optimistic), followed by Bangladesh, China and Vietnam. In contrast, Greece is the most pessimistic (-65% net optimistic) country
A little over 1 person out of 2 (54%) believes 2016 will be better than 2015, 16% think it will be worse and 24% believe 2016 will be the same as 2015
Bangladesh, China, Nigeria, Fiji and Morocco are the most hopeful nations, while Italy is the least hopeful
A happy world in 2015
As 2015 comes to an end, 66% of respondents to the WIN/Gallup International survey say that they are happy, down slightly from 70% in 2014. Of the 66,040 people surveyed, 10% said that they were unhappy, up 4% from 2014. Overall that means that the world is 56% net happy (happiness minus unhappiness). In 2015 the net happiest country in the world is Colombia (85%), in stark contrast the world’s unhappiest country is Iraq at -12% net happiness.
Economic Optimism high across the world
The study shows that 45% of the world is optimistic for the economic outlook in 2016 over double (22%) of those who are pessimistic. It’s perhaps unsurprising that Greece is the most pessimistic (-65% net optimistic) country given their current perilous financial position. The most optimistic nation when it comes to the economy is Nigeria (61% net optimism). When it comes to a demographic breakdown young people prove to be considerably more optimistic than older generations with 31% net optimistic for the under 34s compared to just 13% for the over 55s.
Hope high amongst aspiring nations
As part of their analysis WIN/Gallup International has grouped the world into three tiers: Prosperous (the G7); Emerging (G20 excluding the original G7) and Aspiring (all others) nations. Whilst there is huge disparity in income levels across these three tiers, the level of net happiness across all three (Prosperous 42%, Emerging 59% and Aspiring 54%) is notably high. However, the findings on hope and economic optimism vary markedly across the tiers. According to the global poll, Prosperous nations display the least hope and economic optimism with 6% and -16% respectively; to the contrary Emerging nations are very hopeful about the future and far more optimistic about the economic outlook at 50% and 36% meanwhile the Aspiring nations sit between the two on hope (29%) and economic optimism (16%).
CC-BY-SA-2.0, FlickrEmmanuel Bourdeix, director general de Seeyond y co director de inversiones de Natixis AM. Foto cedida. "Solo una cosa es segura a corto plazo: la incertidumbre está aquí para quedarse… hasta que los datos económicos arrojen luz sobre los fundamentales"
Emmanuel Bourdeix, General Director at Seeyond and Co-CIO at Natixis AM, explains in this interview with Funds Society his view about volatility and the trends we will see in the next months.
Does the volatility has come back to stay? Will it increase in the coming months?
Over 2015 and late 2014, we have observed a period of heightened volatility spikes. Now that the Fed starts normalising its rates after several years of accommodative monetary policy, the beginning of 2016 should probably look very much like the end of 2015, in the sense that market participants will keep on taking a close look at economic data releases to convince themselves that the Fed’s decision was the good one… or not.
More precisely, should strong economic data be published, investors might finally wonder whether the Fed is not behind the curve. Due to this market psychology of “good news is bad news”, we might witness volatility spikes in an environment of robust and favourable fundamentals. Indeed, higher US interest rates as well as an expensive U.S. Dollar could weaken certain market segments, such as emerging markets and U.S. high yield which, in turn, would be a source of contagion and potential increased market volatility.
Conversely, should weak data be released in the coming months on the back of a sustained deterioration of the manufacturing sector in the US, it would mean that the U.S. economy might find itself at the end of an economic cycle with a risk of a recession and that the Fed’s action was inappropriate. To that extent, volatility spikes would occur, with the risk that they become so frequent that it leads over the medium term to a structural adjustment of volatility to the upside.In a nutshell, we believe only one thing is sure over the short term, uncertainty is here to stay… until economic data shed some light on the underlying fundamentals.
Would volatility management be an investment key theme for 2016?
Definitely, volatility will remain a key driver in 2016 in such an uncertain environment. Specialised in extracting value from risk, Seeyond has developed different strategies that can make the most of the current period of low visibility and beyond.For instance, Seeyond’s Minimum Variance strategy offers investors a full exposure to equities with an average risk reduction of 30%. By investing in stocks that display not only low volatilities but also low correlations between each other, we strive to build portfolios that reduces volatility to the lowest, however not at the expense of long term performance: as a matter of fact, academic research, but also empirical observations, suggest that low volatility stocks tend to outperform their peers over long time horizons. This strategy typically fits uncertain environments, like the one we forecast for the coming months.
Beyond, once the economic background gets clearer, be it on the upside or the downside, Seeyond’s multi-asset conservative growth strategy is able to drastically adapt its asset allocation, avoiding markets that would be negatively impacted by the economic environment. Investing in each market independently, the investment process has no structural bias to any asset class in order to provide investors with a robust total return strategy. It combines volatility metrics with fundamentals and momentum indicators, adjusting market views to the underlying risk. To that extent, Seeyond’s multi-asset allocation and minimum variance strategies are complementary and are expected to be a good fit to next year’s environment.
Which are the investment opportunities in the current scenario? Is it more efficient to seek for protection against volatility or to try to take advantage from it?
The arbitrage between seeking protection and exploiting volatility depends on client needs. Intuitively, the cost of holding protection, that is to say the cost of carrying volatility, tends to be expensive in a normalized environment. Investors have to ask themselves if they are not better off selling an overpriced asset. However as structural market crises materialize, investors are potentially compensated for carrying volatility as the crisis unfolds. Volatility has therefore the potential to generate alpha which sets it apart from risk off assets such as cash. This duality is really the corner stone of Seeyond’s investment philosophy around volatility: by looking at the effective cost of carry of volatility instead of its facial level, our strategy is by construction long volatility during a systemic crisis, striving to generate significant value when risk assets are out of favour ; it is short volatility the remainder of the time, striving to provide an additional alpha stream to the overall portfolio.
2016 feels like we are in front of an heightened uncertainty and the outcome from the scenarios we have identified are miles apart. In that context, our firm belief is that allocating to volatility actively has the potential to present investors with the ability to adapt to a favourable scenario while maintaining the ability to generate value should a storm set in.
In this environment how do Seeyond funds help the investors to balance the risk/return equation in their portfolios?
Depending on client needs, balancing risk/return profiles of portfolios can be done on different levels:
– Downside risk protection though structured products (full or partial): investors have a formal protection of their capital whilst being able to participate partially in financial markets’ potential.
– Equity volatility reduction through minimum variance strategies which offer full long-only equity exposure, whilst reducing volatility considerably.
– Risk/return optimisation through total return strategies offering multi asset exposure (equities, fixed income, currencies) based on risk-adjusted allocation
– Active volatility management by investing in equity volatility, an asset class which generates uncorrelated returns to equity markets and thus, significantly enhances the diversification profile of an asset allocation.
It is the 5th anniversary of the Europe Min Variance fund. How has the performance been since the launching?
Since inception and as of end of Sept 2015, Seeyond Europe Minvariance has outperformed its benchmark by more than 15% and reduced volatility by around 30% vs the MSCI Europe NR EUR over the period. Despite varying market configurations, and strong performance shifts encountered over the last 5 years due to various events (among which eurozone debt crisis, FED tapering and European QE, China’s “Black Monday”, etc.), the strategy succeeded in generating consistent returns proving the relevance of its core foundation: focusing on managing the overall level of portfolio volatility does indeed benefit from superior long term risk-adjusted returns. The fund also demonstrated its ability to adapt over different market environments through its reactive allocation from a geographic or industry point of view.
How does the other fund, which invests in derivatives, work? What kind of investors profile and portfolios is it recommended for?
Seeyond’s equity volatility strategy provides investors with a diversification tool that can be used as part of their allocation. It invests in equity volatility actively through listed and liquid instruments, and aims to provide diversification during structural crises. During normalised market conditions, we strive to harvest the equity volatility risk premium in order to generate a moderate total return.
Though this strategy hasn’t had so far the opportunity to experiment a strategic bear market (comparable to 2008 or 2011) in order to demonstrate its ability to generate a decent crisis alpha, it hasn’t exhibited any significant cost of opportunity in comparison with money market investments since its inception in 2012. Therefore, we would recommend this strategy to investors who still hold large portions of cash in their asset allocation: they could arbitrage part of this cash into Seeyond’s equity volatility strategy without any substantial cost while integrating a source of active diversification, should equities enter an undesired bear market.
Global asset manager Legg Mason Inc is in exclusive talks to buy a majority stake in real estate investment manager Clarion Partners LLC in a deal valuing the company at about US$ 850 million, according to Bloomberg. Clarion, which is based in New York and invests in office and retail related real estate, has about US$ 38 billion in assets under management, according to its website.
Under the terms being discussed, the asset manager would buy 80% of the firm from Lightyear Capital, while New York-based Clarion’s current management, headed by Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Stephen Furnary, will retain 20%. Back in November, Reuters reported in that private equity firm Lightyear Capital was looking to sell its majority stake in Clarion Partners LLC for around US$ 800 million. A deal could be announced as early as this month.
Lightyear helped Clarion’s management buy the firm from its previous partner, Dutch financial services company ING Groep NV in 2011. When that deal was struck, the price and ownership structure were not disclosed. Neither Legg Mason, Lightyear or Clarion have made any comments on this matter.
On his weekly commentary, Bob Doll, chief equity strategist and senior portfolio manager at Nuveen Investments, expressed his thoughts on what happened in the markets during 2015, and shared his predictions for 2016.
For investors, this past year was difficult, but not disastrous. A weather-induced U.S. economic slowdown kicked off 2015, and headlines declared a possible messy exit by Greece from the Eurozone. During the summer, a decelerating Chinese economy led to the surprising devaluation of the yuan. In August, this helped trigger a massive drop in U.S. equity markets. As the fall began, investors grew uneasy over the prospects of Federal Reserve tightening. A late-year meltdown in commodities hurt resource-based industries and economies around the world. Geopolitical crises, terrorism and a bizarre U.S. political backdrop all helped boost uncertainty.
The chief headwind for equities was weak corporate earnings. Not surprisingly, the rising U.S. dollar and falling oil prices hurt the energy, materials and industrials sectors. However, these same factors failed to lift consumer-oriented and other “energy-using” sectors. The key to determining the direction of equities next year may well be the direction of corporate earnings.
Despite the negativity and uncertainty, the investing world saw several bright spots in 2015. The U.S. economy grew modestly and unemployment declined significantly. The housing and banking sectors improved. Consumer spending remained strong. The federal deficit fell sharply. And equity markets proved to be resilient, despite downward pressure. Will next year be dominated by the negatives? Will the positives win? Or will confusion and uncertainty continue? With this backdrop, Rob Doll offers his predictions for 2016:
U.S. real GDP remains below 3% and nominal GDP below 5% for an unprecedented tenth year in a row.
U.S. Treasury rates rise for a second year, but high yield spreads fall.
S&P 500 earnings make limited headway as consumer spending advances are partially offset by oil, the dollar and wage rates.
For the first time in almost 40 years, U.S. equities experience a single-digit percentage change for the second year in a row.
Stocks outperform bonds for the fifth consecutive year.
Non-U.S. equities outperform domestic equities, while non-U.S. fixed income outperforms domestic fixed income.
Information technology, financials and telecommunication services outperform energy, materials and utilities.
Geopolitics, terrorism and cyberattacks continue to haunt investors but have little market impact.
The federal budget deficit rises in dollars and as a percentage of GDP for the first time in seven years.
Republicans retain the House and the Senate and capture the White House.
Overall, Rob Doll expects that 2016 will present difficulties for investors, but he still believes there are reasons for optimism. If globaleconomic growth broadens and improves, that could allow corporate revenues and earnings to strengthen. Such a backdrop, combined with still-low inflation and still-easy monetary policy, should allow equities to improve further. Rob Doll encourages investors to maintain overweight positions in equities, and expects 2016 will be another year in which selectivity is paramount to investors’ success.
Despite a general consensus in the financial advice community that saving for retirement should trump paying for a child’s college education, nearly half of Americans disagree. According to a recent poll from RBC Wealth Management-U.S. conducted by Ipsos, 49 percent of Americans place greater importance on helping their children pay for their education than they do on saving for their own retirement.
“As the cost of a college education in the U.S. continues to rise, parents will naturally want to help their kids get through school without accumulating a mountain of debt,” said John Taft, CEO of RBC Wealth Management in the U.S. “But with the gap between how much Americans have saved and what they will need to retire comfortably widening, we advise that people make funding their own retirement a priority. There are no grants, scholarships, or federally guaranteed loans to support them when they leave the workforce.”
Millennials (ages 18 to 34) are the most likely to prioritize financing their children’s education ahead of their own retirement. In fact, 60 percent of Americans in that age group said saving for their kids’ education was more important to them, compared with 43 percent of GenXers (ages 35 to 54) and only 28 percent of Baby Boomers (ages 55 and older).
“These results likely also reflect both philosophical and practical differences between generations,” said Malia Haskins of the Wealth Strategies Group at RBC Wealth Management-U.S. “For Millennials, retirement is much farther away than the more immediate challenge of putting kids through college, so it makes sense that they would put retirement on the back burner. Baby Boomers tend to believe that children should be self-motivated and should have some skin in the game when paying for college. GenXers, meanwhile, are somewhere in the middle. They want to pay for most if not all of college costs for their children, but they also may be nearing retirement and wanting to balance the two goals.”
While saving for retirement should be the priority, by planning and setting realistic goals it is possible for many families to meet both objectives, Haskins says. Planning is especially critical for families with lower household incomes. According to the RBC Wealth Management survey, Americans with household incomes under $50,000 were the most likely (57 percent) to place saving for a child’s education ahead of their own retirement needs.
“Sometimes families find they can fund their retirement and still contribute to a child’s education,” Haskins said. “By looking ahead a little bit, it’s easier to get an overall sense of whether their goals are realistic.”
These are some of the findings of an Ipsos poll conducted on behalf of RBC from October 6 to October 9, 2015. For the survey, a sample of n=2009 Americans was interviewed online via Ipsos’s American online panel, of which 569 are parents with children in the household. The precision of Ipsos online surveys is measured using a Bayesian credibility interval. In this case, with a sample of this size, the results are considered accurate to within ± 4.7 percentage points percentage points, 19 times out of 20, of what they would have been had all American parents been polled.
Research from global analytics firm Cerulli Associates finds that exchange-traded fund (ETF) assets in the United States will grow to more than $6 trillion by 2020, and this number can potentially increase if more asset managers enter the space. Cerulli believes the slow erosion of mutual fund assets by exchange-traded products will prompt a growing number of asset managers to enter the ETF market.
“While many sponsor firms believe the ETF market will continue to grow organically, growth will largely be a result of more investors using the low-cost vehicle,” explains Jennifer Muzerall, senior analyst at Cerulli. “As new investor segments continue to acclimate to ETFs in their portfolios and sponsors develop new products, ETF assets are expected to climb as the industry enters its second decade.”
Cerulli’s report, Exchange-Traded Fund Markets 2015: Opportunities in the Face of Changing Dynamics, analyzes asset managers that manufacture and distribute ETFs in the U.S. The report focuses on the distribution and trends in the ETF market, including active ETFs and strategic beta ETFs, institutional distribution, marketing, and staffing.
“With more asset managers developing an ETF strategy, product proliferation will continue to increase, and firms will need to think strategically about the types of products they develop, attempting to fill any white space that remains untouched,” Muzerall explains. “As investor sentiment is evolving toward solutions-oriented outcomes, sponsors need to think of ETFs no longer solely as a product, but as a tool for investors to achieve their investment objectives.”
Aegon Asset Management created the role of Director of U.S. Consultant Relations, in the middle of December. Fulfilling the new position is Ainsley Borel, who is responsible for distribution of the institutional investment strategies and services offered by Aegon Asset Management’s U.S. member companies to insurers, pension plans, and other benefit plans.
Aegon Asset Management is the global, active investment management arm of Aegon N.V., with centers of investment expertise in Europe and the United States and distribution across the Americas, Europe and Asia. The Aegon Asset Management U.S. member companies include Aegon USA Investment Management, LLC, a SEC-registered investment adviser and manager of fixed income and asset-allocation investment strategies, and Aegon USA Realty Associates, LLC, a real estate asset manager.
“Building strong relationships with institutional consultants is an important element of Aegon Asset Management’s growth strategy in the United States,” said Tom Neukranz, Head of Distribution for Aegon Asset Management U.S. “We are very pleased to have a veteran of Ainsley’s caliber and experience join us in expanding and enhancing relations with the consultant community.”
During 22 years in the investment industry, Borel has managed the distribution of both off-the-shelf investment products and customized investment solutions. Most recently, Borel was a senior vice president and senior consultant relationship manager at Northern Trust Asset Management, responsible for relationships with major domestic and global investment consulting firms.
“Aegon Asset Management U.S. offers what consultants and their clients are looking for in a quality asset manager – a well-defined investment process, strong product line, and experienced investment teams,” said Borel. “I am eager to begin sharing the Aegon Asset Management story with them.”
CC-BY-SA-2.0, FlickrStephen Acheson, director ejecutivo en Standard Life Investments. Foto cedida. Aumenta el apetito por el riesgo entre las aseguradoras europeas
According to a survey conducted by Standard Life Investments, European insurers feel they are unlikely to be able to generate sufficient future returns to meet guaranteed rates for all their policyholders, and that regulatory modernisation and change may make it more challenging for traditional business models to strengthen income streams and make necessary strategic asset allocation changes.
The survey identified five key themes:
Increasingly, European insurers may no longer be able to generate sufficient future returns to meet guaranteed rates to policyholders.
The expected future annual return (based on existing investment strategies) of 2.4% is below the 2.7% respondents need to meet future policyholder requirements (based on current guarantee levels).
In response, many European insurers are considering undertaking significant strategic (SAA) and tactical asset allocation (TAA) changes to improve yield.
Risk appetite appears to be rising. Half of insurers expect to reduce sovereign fixed income exposure, while over 60% expect to increase allocations to real estate and/or alternatives.
However, the survey highlights a ‘north/south’ divide on asset allocation, with Southern European countries having more confidence in existing investment strategies due in part to higher domestic yields on their sovereign fixed income.
Insurers’ investment freedom is affected by Solvency II.
73% of insurers indicated that the forthcoming EU Directive is affecting the way they design investment portfolios as the taking of asset risk now requires appropriate risk-capital and a fuller understanding of the risks being taken.
Outsourcing asset management activity is increasingly attractive, but there are concerns about fund management capacity and the number of asset managers able to meet complex insurer requirements.
44% of European insurers are looking to outsource management of one or more asset classes.
Insurer business models and profitability are under pressure from a structural shift away from guaranteed savings to unit-linked structures.
43% of insurers stated they were unable to price new guaranteed investment products at competitive rates.
When the survey was conducted over the summer, European insurers felt they had further work to do before they would be completely ready for Solvency II. As evidenced by the many internal model approvals that have been announced recently, very good progress has been made in the interim. 56 interviews were carried out with senior insurance investment executives representing over €2.4trn, or around 30%, of pan-European insurance assets under management.
Stephen Acheson, Executive Director, Standard Life Investments said: “European insurers’ business strategies and traditional business models are being fundamentally challenged due to the combination of the long-term low return environment, Solvency II and the ongoing need to deliver on promised guarantees. The survey highlighted a clear theme of insurers looking to outsource to the external asset management industry. However, it also highlights a belief among insurers that the number of credible outsourcing partners is declining. It is important to remember that Solvency II was conceived and developed in a very different economic environment. Since our survey completed, fundamental questions about the design and performance of the Solvency II balance sheet in the current low interest rate environment have begun to be raised. For example, in the UK the PRA has recently pointed out that, as a consequence of low interest rates, the risk margin is leading to higher capital requirements and volatility. So the Solvency II development and implementation issues that the European industry has been working on over recent years will certainly not end on 1 January 2016.”
Standard Life Investments has 69 insurance clients investing balance sheet assets in over 20 countries, representing an AUM of £137bn as of the second quarter of 2015.
