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Scotiabank Joins CONCACAF as Official Partner

Scotiabank pone nombre a la Liga de Campeones CONCACAF — Foto cedida. Scotiabank Joins CONCACAF as Official Partner

The Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) has announced an official partnership with Scotiabank, designating the international bank as title sponsor of the CONCACAF Champions League and official bank of the Confederation.

The multi-year agreement makes Scotiabank the first official partner of CONCACAF, and covers multiple tournaments through 2018 including the region’s most important club competition – the CONCACAF Champions League –now to be known as the Scotiabank Champions League beginning February 2015 with the Championship Round of the on-going 2014-15 edition.

“I am extremely proud to welcome Scotiabank to the CONCACAF football family and commemorate this strategic partnership,” said CONCACAF President Jeffrey Webb. “This agreement exemplifies the growing value of CONCACAF’s properties and demonstrates the trust and confidence in our Confederation.”

Headquartered in Toronto, Scotiabank is Canada’s most international bank, with a presence in over 55 countries including Latin America, the Caribbean and parts of Asia. The Bank offers a broad range of products and services, including personal and commercial banking, wealth management, corporate and investment banking, to over 21 million customers.

“Scotiabank is proud of our deep roots and strong commitment in the CONCACAF regions – supporting customers, businesses and communities for over 180 years,” said John Doig, Scotiabank’s Chief Marketing Officer. “This partnership is a natural fit for Scotiabank. Football is a passion we share with our customers and we’re excited to support current and future football stars. We are looking forward to celebrating the sportsmanship and teamwork of this beautiful game.”

In addition to title sponsorship of the Champions League, Scotiabank becomes an official sponsor for the CONCACAF Gold Cup – the Confederation’s flagship event for national teams – for 2015 and 2017.

Scotiabank will also support multiple additional CONCACAF tournaments through 2018, including 2016 Olympic Qualifying events, and men’s and women’s tournaments at the under-20 and under-17 levels, starting with the CONCACAF Men’s Under-20 Championship Jamaica 2015, set to kick off in January.

The deal further includes sponsorship for the next two editions of the CFU Caribbean Cup and the UNCAF Central American Cup, as well as upcoming CONCACAF championships in Beach Soccer, Futsal and at the Girls’ and Boys’ under-15 levels.

“When we extended our agreement with CONCACAF in late 2013, we focused on restructuring the sponsorship program in line with global standards led by CONCACAF Partners,” said Aaron Davidson, President of Traffic Sports USA, the sponsorship rights agency of CONCACAF. “Scotiabank is the perfect founding CONCACAF Partner thanks to their footprint across the region and their commitment to sport and the communities they serve.”

The partnership was announced in an event hosted at the Mexican Stock Exchange in Mexico City on Tuesday morning, with the presence of special invited guests from the Mexican and international soccer community including Mexican Football Federation President Justino Compean.

Matthews Asia Hires Head of U.K. Business Development

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Matthews Asia announces the appointment of Neil Steedman as Head of U.K. Business Development. Based in London, Neil will be responsible for directing the firm’s business development and client service activities in the U.K. and select European markets.

Neil has extensive experience working with institutional and professional investors, including local authorities, discretionary wealth managers, private banks, and global financial institutions, as well as leading platforms, including 10 years at Aberdeen Asset Management where he served as Head of U.K. Discretionary Sales.

Reporting to Jonathan Schuman, Head of Global Business Development, Neil’s hire marks an important step in the continued build-out of Matthews Asia’s global operations and highlights the company’s long-term commitment to the U.K. and European marketplace.

Neil Steedman, Head of U.K. Business Development, commented: “I am excited to join Matthews Asia as it continues to grow its business in the U.K. and Europe, and thrilled to be part of the team that will bring the firm’s distinctive investment approach and long-term focus on Asia to U.K. and European-based investors. Matthews Asia’s extensive product line-up and the firm’s long-term, fundamental approach to investing are ideally suited for institutional and professional investors’ portfolios.”

Jonathan Schuman, Head of Global Business Development, commented: “Neil’s appointment reflects Matthews Asia’s strategic commitment to provide distinctive Asian investment strategies and high-quality service to our partners and investors across the U.K. and Europe. We are pleased that a growing number of investors have recognized Matthews Asia’s specialist capabilities. The expansion of our local presence in Europe reflects the long-term importance that we place on providing quality products and service to our clients.”

Art Basel’s Show in Miami Beach – One of the Strongest Editions Ever

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Art Basel’s 13th edition in Miami Beach closed Sunday, December 7, 2014, amidst strong praise from gallerists, private collectors, museum groups and the media.

Highlights of the show included the introduction of the new Survey sector, which brought 13 art-historical projects to the fair, including many rare works never before exhibited in an art fair context; and Art Basel’s staging with Performa of Ryan McNamara’s ‘MEƎM 4 Miami: A Story Ballet About the Internet’ at the Miami Grand Theater. Solid sales were reported across all levels of the market and throughout the run of the show.

Featuring 267 leading international galleries from 31 countries, the show – whose Lead Partner is UBS – attracted an attendance of 73,000 over five days. Attendees included representatives of over 160 museum and institution groups from across the world – and a surging number of new private collectors from the Americas, Europe and Asia.

Following a 100 percent reapplication rate for the Galleries sector and with new galleries coming from across the world, the list of exhibitors was the strongest to date in Miami Beach, firmly solidifying the show’s position as the leading international art fair of the Americas.

On Wednesday, December 3, Art Basel and BMW announced a new partnership supporting emerging artists. Starting in 2015, the BMW Art Journey will enable emerging artists to go on a journey of creative discovery to a destination of their choice. Functioning as a mobile studio, the BMW Art Journey is open to artists from Positions and Discoveries, Art Basel’s sectors for emerging artists in Miami Beach and Hong Kong. The show also marked the successful launch of Art Basel’s Next tours program for emerging collectors. A total of 80 collectors drawn from 12 young patrons groups of international museums attended bespoke tours of the fair and had intimate sessions with exhibiting galleries.

Art Basel’s next show in Miami Beach will take place from December 3 to December 6, 2015. Starting after the 2015 edition, the Miami Beach Convention Center will undergo major renovation, phased around the 2016 show, with the aim to finish the renovation before Art Basel returns to Miami Beach in December 2017.

Dagong Global Will Become Sole Shareholder of Dagong Europe

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Dagong Europe has announced that its majority shareholder Dagong Global Credit Rating Co. Ltd. (Dagong Global) has completed an adjustment to the shareholding structure of the company.

Through the adjustment, Dagong Global has acquired the 40% shares previously owned by Mandarin Capital Partners (MCP), therefore becoming the sole shareholder of Dagong Europe Credit Rating Srl (Dagong Europe).

Jianzhong Guan, chairman of Dagong Global and of Dagong Europe commented “Dagong Global’s strategy in the European rating market is to build up a new bridge that pumps up mutual investment between China and Europe and to undertake rating responsibility to guard off credit risks by providing just and authoritative rating information for Chinese investors. We believe that we will reap great fruit from the unique blueprint that caters for the historical demands of Europe. We are grateful that MCP co-founded Dagong Europe with us, and I hope that we could continue our cooperation in the future to help Dagong Europe to thrive”. Lorenzo Stanca, deputy chairman at Dagong Europe and managing partner at MCP, commented “we believe that Dagong Europe has a significant potential to become a key player in the credit rating industry in Europe. The results obtained in the first year from the obtainment of the Licence from ESMA confirm such an expectation, in a sector that is bound to see important changes and reshuffles, following years of dominance of the three big U.S. players.

Ulrich Bierbaum, general manager of Dagong Europe added, “I’m confident that the new ownership structure will provide even stronger support for Dagong Europe’s future growth plans, as we can leverage fully the internationally renowned Dagong brand. We will keep promoting the Dagong brand under Chairman Guan’s guidance by providing top-notch quality services to European issuers and Chinese investors.”

Dagong Europe Credit Rating srl (Dagong Europe) was established in March 2012 with headquarters in Milan, Italy. In June 2013, Dagong Europe received authorization and registration by the European Securities Market Authority (‘ESMA’) under the Article 16 of the CRA regulation. Dagong Global Credit RatingCo., Ltd., headquartered in Beijing, is the sole owner of the company.

Dagong Europe provides credit opinions on financial institutions including insurance companies and non-financial corporates, producing autonomously Procedures, Criteria and models that are the foundations of the credit rating process.

Dagong, the biggest credit rating agency in China, has 600 employees, including over 300 analysts with master’s and doctor’s degree, and over 50 post-doctoral researchers. Over 30 branch offices in China provide credit information services for clients at home and abroad.

Asset Managers are Turning to Index Derivatives to Mitigate Risk

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Asset managers have told TABB Group that they are focusing more attention on index derivatives as market structure changes in both OTC and cash markets are impacting their portfolio decisions. As they change the way they manage cash flows and risk exposures, index derivatives are seeing greater growth as part of the evolution of existing strategies, already generating record level volumes on multiple days in October 2014.

According to Matt Simon, a TABB principal, head of futures research and author “US. Equity Index Derivatives: The Next Phase of Institutional Discovery,” traditional drivers of equity-index based derivatives usage will persist, evolving over time with asset managers using index products to equitize cash, hedge risk, gain exposure to underlying reference markets and search for new ways to gain alpha when provided with the right opportunities. “If recent volumes during October are any signal of what to expect in 2015, the changes for increased adoption are already taking hold.”

This growth potential has not gone unnoticed. “The recent announcement by the London Stock Exchange (LSE) concerning its acquisition of Frank Russell and its lucrative index operations for $2.7 billion highlights the current appeal of owning an index business,” says Simon.

For this study, which covers market validation, the most active products, electronic order routing, brokerage routing decisions, executing brokers’ market share, trading product selection, and regulatory impact, TABB interviewed 26 firms, including long-only asset managers, hedge funds, commodity trading advisers (CTAs) and pension managers with $6 trillion in total Assets under Management (AuM), It also includes interviews with sell-side trading desks, market makers, proprietary trading firms, technology providers and exchanges, conducted during the second quarter 2014.

Top findings include:

92% of long-only funds, hedge funds and CTAs say their equity index derivatives volumes will increase over the next year.
E-mini S&P 500 remains the most active futures contract by a wide margin with SPY the leading options index product, January-September 2014 vs. January-September 2013.
Nearly 60% of buy side trade through clearing broker(s).
For brokers, cost of execution and service levels are most important selection criteria.
Hedge funds and CTAs say they are interested in sophisticated trading functionality to support their derivatives activity; leading OMSs and EMSs received mixed results.

Rather than being used as a pure alpha generating tool, says Simon, hedge funds are using index products to manage the growing number of market risks. “Facing a more difficult operating environment, they’re not only being forced to improve their balance sheets and lower risk exposures, they’re being driven by pressure from their prime brokers to improve the management of their risk exposure.”

The 30-page 22-exhibit study is available for download by TABB Group Research Alliance Futures clients at this link.

New Asset Inflows into US listed ETF/ETPs were US$42.4 billion in November, Setting a New Record

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ETFGI’s research finds 2014 is proving to be a very good year for the ETF/ETP industry in the United States. The ETF/ETP industry in the United States reached a new record of US$1.98 trillion in assets at the end of November. They expect to see assets break through the US$2 trillion milestone any day.

At the end of November 2014 the US ETF/ETP industry had 1,659 ETFs/ETPs, from 68 providers listed on 3 exchanges. Net new asset inflows into US listed ETF/ETPs were US$42.4 billion in November, which is a record month, beating the previous high of US$41.2 billion set in July 2013.

The global ETF/ETP industry has reached a new record of US$2.76 trillion in assets. They expect the assets to break through the US$3 trillion milestone in the first half of 2015.

“Economic news in Europe during November was not positive with the OECD warning that Europe was the “locus of weakness” in the global economy – criticising the ECB’s efforts to combat economic stagnation. Many found the EC’s investment plan as lacking new money and new ideas with even the Pope criticising the plan. During November the US market continued its positive trend with both the S&P 500 and the Dow closing up 3% for the month. Developed markets ended the month up 1% while emerging markets declined 1%.” according to Deborah Fuhr, Managing Partner at ETFGI.

In November 2014 ETFs/ETPs listed in the United States saw net inflows of US$42.4 billion. Equity net inflows of US$41.2 Bn in November were a record month, beating the previous high of US$37.2 Bn in July 2013, followed by fixed income ETFs/ETPs with US$1.7 Bn, whilst commodity ETFs/ETPs saw net outflows of US$321 Mn.

iShares gathered the largest net ETF/ETP inflows in November with US$11.9 Bn, followed by SPDR ETFs with US$10.8 Bn and Vanguard with US$8.7 Bn net inflows. iShares is the largest ETF/ETP provider in terms of assets with US$757 Bn, reflecting 38.2% market share; SPDR ETFs is second with US$433 Bn and 21.8% market share, followed by Vanguard with US$421 Bn and 21.3% market share. The top three ETF/ETP providers, out of 68, account for 81.3% of US ETF/ETP assets, while the remaining 65 providers each have less than 5% market share.

Morgan Stanley Launches The Institute of Family Wealth Management

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Morgan Stanley lanza un nuevo instituto de gestión patrimonial familiar — Wikimedia CommonsPhoto: Jenix89. Morgan Stanley Launches The Institute of Family Wealth Management

Morgan Stanley Wealth Management has announced the launch of its Institute of Family Wealth Management (IFWM) to focus on family wealth which is part of a powerful strategy designed to help its Financial Advisors better serve clients’ growing multigenerational needs.

The IFWM is the first-of-its-kind interactive e-learning program that will give Financial Advisors the resources, process and knowledge to transform individual relationships into family relationships. The curriculum, which is entirely digital and accessible via tablet or PC, addresses the important planning needs of clients and their entire families, including spouses, children and aging parents, and the skills to engage these family members in the planning process.

“We are on the cusp of the largest wealth transfer in history, and we recognize the need for industry-leading family-focused solutions,” said Andy Saperstein, Head of Investment Products and Services. “The IFWM demonstrates our dedicated approach to building meaningful family relationships.”

The Firm’s most highly regarded wealth management experts, including Financial Advisors who already do this well, not only informed the content, but provide practical and tactical advice, via video messages and best practices, on how to apply the learnings in client engagements.

The Family Wealth Advisor designation, earned upon completion of the program, indicates a mastery of topics such as estate planning from the family perspective, families and philanthropy and family enterprises, as well as demonstrated ability to have effective conversations that help families understand and transition wealth from one generation to another.

“Innovative approaches such as the IFWM are part of our ongoing efforts to enhance the effectiveness of our Financial Advisors to the benefit of our clients,” said Jim Tracy, director of Morgan Stanley’s Consulting Group Wealth Advisory Solutions. “By building stronger relationships with clients and their entire families, we will lead the industry with our distinct family focus. Online advice is proliferating, but nothing can replace the value of personal advice from a highly trained professional who can ask the right questions.”

Morningstar Launches Family of More Than 60 New Global Equity Indexes

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Morningstar lanza 60 nuevos índices de renta variable — . Morningstar Launches Family of More Than 60 New Global Equity Indexes

Morningstar has launched more than 60 new global equity indexes. Now, Morningstar’s index family spans 45 countries in both developed and emerging markets. The new indexes provide investors with benchmarking tools that reflect the performance of equity markets worldwide and will serve as the foundation for the next generation of Morningstar “strategic beta” indexes.

“As more and more individual investors, advisors, and institutions take a global perspective to investing, our new index family will provide them with meaningful, consistent worldwide views across market capitalizations and regions to provide a deeper understanding of market behavior throughout the globe,” Sanjay Arya, head of Morningstar Indexes, said.

Morningstar’s new index family comprises global, regional, and country-specific indexes using a transparent, rules-based methodology with a focus on the investability of the underlying securities. The new index family can help investors with:

Market monitoring—Comprehensive and non-overlapping, the indexes allow investors to analyze performance trends and market movements around the globe.
Asset allocation—The global equity indexes reflect the risk and return profiles of each developed and emerging market country and can help investors build better model portfolios.
Attribution analysis—Investors can use the indexes to perform attribution analysis to understand what drives a manager’s or portfolio’s performance.

Currently, the indexes are available with end-of-day returns and constituent data in Morningstar Direct, the firm’s research platform for institutions. In the coming months, the company will add the indexes into Morningstar Advisor Workstation^S and Morningstar.com, investment platforms for advisors and individuals, respectively. Morningstar also plans to roll out real-time calculations early next year for the development of market monitoring tools and strategic beta indexes. Morningstar defines strategic beta indexes as those that seek to either improve performance or alter the level of risk relative to a standard benchmark.

Introduced in 2002, the Morningstar Indexes include a broad range of traditional beta equity, fixed income, and commodity indexes that are also combined to form asset allocation index series. In addition, Morningstar Indexes offers a family of strategic beta indexes that draw on the equity, fund, and asset allocation research across the company. Currently, Morningstar has more than 280 indexes and approximately 40 exchange-traded products track Morningstar Indexes globally.

Defusing the Fiscal Timebomb

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Standard Life Investments warns that the public finances of developed countries are still vulnerable to an economic shock unless more is done to boost growth and reduce debt.

In the latest edition of Global Perspective, research by Standard Life Investments shows that sovereign debt in the developed economies of the OECD has ballooned since the financial crisis and that a renewed recession would push debt to even more worrying levels. Governments and central banks should act now to reduce their fiscal imbalances.

Countries can help improve their debt outlooks by pursuing growth friendly policies alongside prudent, long-term credible fiscal planning. The best policy response should include a combination of monetary stimulus, investment in infrastructure and deep structural reform. Without these measures, countries may resort to more painful and damaging economic policies to deal with high public debt burdens.

Jeremy Lawson, Chief Economist, Standard Life Investments, said: “The financial crisis has left a deep scar on public sector balance sheets across the developed world. Increases in debt, lower nominal growth rates and weakened budget positions have made governments vulnerable to another economic shock. What can be done to make public finances more robust and reduce debt positions?

“Our simple debt equation helps to provide some answers and shows that improving the nominal growth outlook provides the best policy option. Some economies, particularly those in the Eurozone, require further monetary stimulus alongside a temporary, targeted loosening of fiscal policy.

“More generally, countries should look to boost long-term growth rates by accelerating structural reforms aimed at boosting productivity. Public infrastructure investment is another avenue to promote growth, with the added attraction of being fiscally neutral if done effectively. Longer-term consolidation plans must also be enhanced.”

Wells Fargo Survey: Affluent Women ‘Enjoy’ Making Money

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A strong majority (93%) of affluent women “enjoy making and accumulating money” and more than half (53%) believe that money helps buy happiness, according to a new Wells Fargo survey of affluent women. Women have a strong sense of pride in earning money with 85% of them saying they feel proud about their earning power. Versta Research conducted the survey of 1,872 women, ages 40-79 with at least $250,000 in household investable assets, to examine their perspectives on wealth, investing, work and retirement.

Affluent women are taking the lead in managing the daily finances with 82% percent managing the household budget and purchase decisions, 79% managing the household cash flow and 75% paying the bills. But only 46% of these women are taking primary responsibility for choosing and managing investment accounts, and this rate falls to 34% among married women. Affluent women in their 40s buck this trend, with more than half (56%) choosing and managing investment accounts.

As their wealth has increased, 43% of affluent women say they have become more competent at handling investments, while 53% stayed the same and 4% became less competent. Along similar lines, a minority of these women (36%) say they have become more involved in financial decision making, while a majority (58%) say their involvement in financial decision making has stayed the same and 6% became less involved.

“I don’t think I’ve seen a study where women so overwhelming express joy at earning money and pride in their capacity to do so. And, they credit the stock market for increasing their wealth. However, we see fewer women managing their investments, although that is changing. The good news is more younger women in the workplace are taking on the role of investing for their households. If you are making money and you think the market is helping your money to grow, then it makes sense to be more directly involved in investment decisions,” said Karen Wimbish, director of Retail Retirement at Wells Fargo.

Wealth and the Stock Market

While a majority of affluent women (94%) feel they’ve worked hard to create their wealth, 68% acknowledge that most of their wealth has been generated by investments and growth in the stock market. More than three-quarters (78%) feel the stock market is the best way to grow savings over the long term. In fact, nearly two-thirds (64%) of affluent women say it’s more exciting to watch assets grow through good investments in the stock market versus watching it grow by earning and saving them (36%).

Given the stock market’s growth over the last five years, 37% of affluent women say they are “more eager to put money into the market right now,” while 23% are “more reluctant to put money in the stock market now” and 40% admit they “don’t pay much attention to the stock market.” Interestingly, almost three-quarters (73%) disagree that the stock market is too risky for them while 27% agree. But this is tempered with the more than half of women (54%) worried about losing money in the stock market.

The Role of Work

Work is an instrumental part of life for affluent women. In fact, three-quarters of affluent working women say having a job or career is important to them even if they don’t need the money. Two-thirds feel they are fairly compensated at work today. Yet, 59% of affluent working women don’t think women will achieve pay equality in the workplace in the next 10 years.

Sixty-two percent believe that women can “have it all” when it comes to balancing their career and family. However, only 38% say “having it all” is their goal (of whom 81% feel they are succeeding at it). Two-thirds (65%) of affluent women believe fathers should be more proactive about staying home to help raise children. Even if “having it all” is not the goal of many affluent working women, 58% say they are struggling with work-life balance. If given the opportunity for a big promotion at work that offered a significant step up from their current role and level of responsibilities, two-thirds (66%) of affluent women would accept it (of which 31% would be “excited, eager, and ready for it” and 35% would “accept it, but with reservations”) and 34% would decline it. Of those who would “accept it, but with reservations,” 53% worry about managing work-life balance, 30% worry about whether they are ready and have the skills to succeed, 16% are not sure if their current career path is what they really want and 23% cite other reasons.

Bequeathing the Financial Knowledge

While generally most affluent women would agree their parents did a good job teaching them about managing and saving money when they were growing up, more than two-thirds say no one ever taught them how to invest in the stock market. Nearly all affluent women (98%) say it’s important for women to feel confident about investing, but fewer (71%) actually do. One in five (21%) say one of their biggest financial regrets is not learning more about money and finance. While nearly one-third (30%) think that men are more interested in finances and investing, a majority (89%) don’t think men are better at it and half of affluent women think that men are overconfident when it comes to investing.

“It is interesting to see that affluent women credit their wealth to the stock market even though most say that no one taught them how to invest in the market,” said Wimbish. “These are successful women that should have the confidence and interest in making investment decisions for their future.”

Saving for Retirement

Affluent women are well-positioned for retirement. While the financial crisis did not affect the financial well-being for a majority of affluent women (57%), it did impact their savings behavior. More than half (54%) say it made them “more aggressive about saving money.” Only 48% of non-retired affluent women have an annual savings goal, and the median annual goal is $20,000. Non-retirees have saved a median of $600,000 and have a median goal of $1 million. They plan to retire at the average age of 64. While three out of four affluent women agree that they need at least $1 million to “feel wealthy,” 42% feel they would need $2 million or more.

“It’s crucial to have a savings goal so you know if you are on track. These women have the means and are disciplined savers, but having a financial plan with an investment strategy can put them on an even better path,” said Wimbish.

The affluent women surveyed exude confidence about having enough money. Four out of five (82%) non-retirees feel confident they will have enough money to live the kind of retirement they want. Nearly all (95%) of retired affluent women feel they will have enough money in retirement.

Seventy-two percent of non-retirees value their assets and wealth more for the lifestyle and security it will afford them in retirement versus the lifestyle and security it gives them right now (28%). The top three things that scare affluent women about retirement are: losing their health (55%), losing their mental abilities (52%) and running out of money (29%).

Defining a Successful Retirement

In defining a successful retirement, more than half of affluent women feel it is having enough money for their preferred lifestyle (55%), with other top choices including being healthy (23%) or spending time with family and friends (13%). When non-retirees think about their future in retirement, they look forward to spending more time with family (64%), focusing on physical fitness (63%) and becoming more charitable with their time (58%).

While it is hard to imagine what life will be in retirement, half of non-retirees (52%) anticipate their expectations and goals will change once they retire. Fifty-eight percent of retired affluent women say they did not have a realistic picture of what life in retirement would be like until they were in their 60s and beyond. And 43% of retired women say their retirement years are different from what they imagined.

“Life in retirement is hard to imagine until you are actually living in it. Having the fortitude to have a financial plan with realistic goals for saving and investing will allow you to recalibrate your retirement dreams when the time comes,” said Wimbish.