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MAX Award winners and the new world outside
Half-way through the MAX and Investment Leadership awards for 2022, the audience was silenced by researcher and co-organiser Alex Dunnin. He said: ‘Life has caught up with us.” His forecasts were chillin
Why China is ahead in the cycle
China is a little ahead of the US in the current re-pricing of global equities. That, coupled with western geopolitical concerns, has presented a new round of opportunities.
Best bets at the MAX Awards
While the media they use have been in a state of constant disruption for at least 25 years, the noble arts of sales and marketing remain steadfast in pursuit of their goals. Next month’s MAX Awards will tell us how they are faring.
Allspring’s plans for Australian expansion
The former Wells Fargo Asset Management, a 52-year-old pioneering US fund manager, has targeted Australia and New Zealand in its new incarnation as an independent global firm. Allspring Global Investments’ regional expansion is being led by new regional chief executive, Andy Sowerby. If history is a guide, the rollout of institutional funds management capabilities will […]
Mental health: enough awareness; action needed
Thanks in part to the pandemic, employers now have sufficient awareness of mental health problems in the workforce, their human and economic costs. Now is the time for programs to solve them. A multi-country, multi-industry webinar last week (December 9) looked at how employers should learn from the impact of Covid-19 and put in place […]
Top hedge fund award goes to L1 Capital
L1 Capital has taken out the prestigious ‘Alternative Investment Manager of the Year Award’ at the annual Australian Alternative Investment Awards for 2021. The award presentations were held in conjunction with the 20th anniversary Hedge Funds Rock charity dinner in Sydney last Friday night (December 10). They represented a welcome and lively return to normality […]
What it takes to be a top fund manager
Key characteristics which shone out in the winners of the top categories at this year’s Zenith Investment Partners awards were a pioneering spirit and persistence. The winner of the ‘Fund Manager of the Year’ award, Perpetual Asset Management, can boast possibly the oldest Australian equities fund, and adherence to its long-term focus and value style […]
Looking beyond a rising market
Many investors have benefited from surging asset prices over the past 12 months, but the question they should ask is whether the rising tide has lifted all boats. In the second of two articles highlighting some of the finalists at the upcoming 10th Annual Zenith Investment Partners Awards, The Inside Adviser provides a little background […]
The inside running for Zenith’s fund awards
Insiders at the Zenith Investment Partners annual awards know that you can improve your chances of guessing the winner of the major Fund Manager of the Year category by studying history. For instance, in the past 10 years since the annual awards have been held – this is the 10th year – no winner of […]
Matt Rady’s big new job
Having left the ambitious specialist retirement start-up of the Allianz Insurance group, Allianz Retire+, in July, Matt Rady was this week named as CEO of BT Financial Group. Rady became the inaugural CEO of Allianz Retire+ in June 2018, after a long search during which the firm’s founder and driving force, Adrian Stewart, a former […]
Wealth sector attracts insto-grade player
The growth and sophistication of the wealth management market is attracting new interest from formerly institutional providers. Now bfinance, a global manager search and research consultant, has entered the wealth space, including in Australia. bfinance, a London-based privately owned business established in 1999, has completed its first survey of wealth management companies, the results of […]
When disenchantment follows the honeymoon
In the Allianz Retire+ five phases of retirement, wedged between phases three, ‘liberation’, and four, ‘reorientation’, comes ‘disenchantment’. It is often the most challenging and important for an adviser to manage. In a webinar last week (September 8), Alex Brown, Allianz Retire + senior business development manager, chaired the third in a series for advisers […]
PIMCO’s recipe for portfolio protection
While there has been much talk about renewed inflation and its harm to portfolios, thanks largely to the US economic recovery, the consensus is this will be transitory. That may be wrong. PIMCO, the world’s largest fixed income manager, believes that there is more risk in the current inflation bogey than the market is anticipating. […]
Finalists for Zenith’s funds management awards
The 10th annual Zenith Investment Partners funds management awards will be live-streamed this year, on October 15, with the list of 22 awards having been fine-tuned for the occasion. A new award has been added – global small-cap equities – but two previously separate awards – Best Exchange Traded Fund and Best Listed Investment Company […]
Hidden ESG risks in popular stocks and funds
As investors put more and more money into ESG-focused products, so too are they getting more sophisticated in their selection – in both what they are favouring and what they are avoiding. Perhaps they should consider avoiding dividend stocks and funds. Research from Morningstar, published last week (August 26), using work by Sustainalytics, its specialist […]
Retirement incomes the new battleground for advisers
The government feels it has adequately dealt with the issue of how financial advisers go about their business. Now it is focused on the advice itself, with retirement incomes the new battleground. Into the fray yesterday (August 23) the Actuaries Institute launched its new policy document, ‘Securing Adequate Retirement Incomes for an Ageing Australia’ Download […]
Smaller investors look to private debt
Private debt is starting to attract a broader range of investors, including high-net-worth individuals and smaller funds that are searching for yield combined with capital preservation. The attraction, alongside the asset class’ traditional supporters among the big super funds, has also been helped by increasing concerns about inflationary expectations – whether this will be transitory […]
Sustainable funds boom surges to another record
Flows into ESG-focused managed funds hit a record $2.9 billion during the June quarter, as total assets in that group jumped 66 per cent for the full 12 months, according to the latest report by Morningstar, for Australia and New Zealand. The report, based on a universe of 135 Australia and New Zealand ‘sustainable funds,’ […]
Singularity: where innovation meets sustainability
In the beginning, was the word and the word was ‘ethical’. Now we have lots of words: ‘responsible’, ‘sustainable’, ‘stewardship’, ‘environmental’, ‘social’ and ‘governance’. And perhaps a new word: ‘singularity’.The Singularity Group is a Zurich-based global investment boutique and research firm which uses quantitative techniques to seek out companies which have sustainable innovation as part […]
Why advisers can’t ignore bitcoin
Craig Hobart, a veteran of the business side of funds management, is thinking of putting a link to an ASIC podcast on his new company’s website. It provides the regulator’s views on cryptocurrencies. The new company is the Brisbane-based Monochrome Asset Management, formed in April by a crypto veteran Jeff Yew and where Hobart’s younger […]
New opportunities in commercial property
What is to become of all those office buildings and retail stores? They will be replaced, of course, at least in investor portfolios. The property sector is already pivoting to the new opportunities. If there’s an investment sector which has more than its fair share of disruption due to the impact of covid-19 it has […]
The allure of gold remains
Gold has intrigued investors for almost as long as its existence, first as a store of wealth and currency and now as, well, what? Asset consultancy Frontier has taken a look at gold’s worth to professional investors. And it’s not about an inflation hedge. Frontier’s Chris Trevillyan, director of investment strategy, and Nicholas Thomas, senior […]
What advisers need to know about dementia
The ageing population has many implications for financial advisers – more than the growing numbers either transitioning to or already in retirement. There is also the matter of dementia. The law allows an adviser to assume a person’s decision-making ability, but the law, like financial services, is complex. With either discipline, a wrong action can […]
Lockdown means a greater need to reach out
Rob Prugue, well-known investment manager and a former regional chief executive of Lazard Asset Management, has called on the financial services industry to appreciate the need for extra awareness of people’s mental state during the current lockdowns in Sydney and Melbourne. Prugue, the founder and director of People Reaching Out to People (PROP), a mental […]
Fidante’s Ox Capital the new home for top manager
Joseph Lai, the top-performing Asia equities manager who resigned from Platinum Asset Management on December 29 last year, is set to join Fidante’s new boutique, Ox Capital. He will reportedly link up with another long-term emerging markets specialist, Doug Huey. The two had worked together at Platinum, where Huey was an investment analyst, prior to […]
Advisers take a fresh look at emerging markets
A confluence of largely unrelated trends is prompting advisers to rethink their former reticence about emerging markets for all but their better-heeled clients. They are taking a whole-world approach. According to Jorden Brown, Capital Group’s Sydney-based managing director in charge of financial intermediaries, advisers have long accepted the investment fundamentals of emerging markets (EM), such […]
Perennial proves a point with Better Future
If investors ever had any concerns about whether the Perennial ‘Better Future’ strategy was giving up any potential returns through its ESG orientation, the actual results should put them to rest. The strategy, available through a standard unlisted unit trust, the listed active managed fund vehicle (ASX: IMPQ) and mandates on request, has averaged 14.7 […]
UBS on ‘Alts in the Asian Century’
Like all big investors, global asset managers have to have a view on China. Most also have a view on alternatives, even if seen only as competition to traditional investment management. Against this backdrop, UBS Asset Management held its inaugural global investor conference, virtually, last month (May 19-20), in which many discussions inevitably led to […]
Beware the losers among thematic fund winners
Thematically focussed funds have been the big winners in fund flows in the past three years, but most themes have turned out to be fads, new research shows. According to Morningstar’s latest ‘Global Thematic Funds Landscape Report’, link here, over the three years through March 2021, collective assets under management in the 1,349 thematic funds […]
How robo-advice leads to further investments
While the buzz surrounding its introduction just over ten years ago has abated, an increasing body of research is building on the value of robo-advice. A new paper shows the benefits can be wide-reaching. More than a marketing tool for index managers or various asset allocators and other agents, robo-advice, when properly constructed with a […]
Neuberger Berman’s fixed income strategies for the times
With records still being set by both equities and bond markets, investor uncertainty abounds. It would seem that these times are made for both active management and experience. Among bond markets, the possibility of higher inflation, especially in the US, is prompting fears of rising interest rates, and therefore falling prices, with investors looking further […]
New Evergreen, Generation investment bond
Evergreen Consultants has teamed with Generation Life for the launch of an ESG-orientated multi-manager investment bond, believed to be an industry first. The bond follows a model portfolio developed by Evergreen, called the Responsible Growth Model. The research and ratings firm says the model was created to provide advisers and investors with a long-term portfolio […]
Equity funds back in vogue
Australian investors put more money into traditional equity funds in February and March than they did in the whole of 2019, prior to the impact of covid-19. A new index shows Australians also had more conviction. According to figures from Calastone, which passes about 95 per cent of all fund flows, mostly from platforms, to […]
Wealthier investors open to advice
More high-net-worth (HNW) investors are open to receiving financial advice than a year ago, but they are yet to do so, according to the latest report from Investment Trends. There were an estimated 485,000 such investors on September 30 last. The report, the 13th in the firm’s annual series, is billed as the largest of […]
Research Affiliates on ‘the trade of the decade’
Factor manager Research Affiliates appears to be charging in where value managers are still nervous to tread, with a big call on the state of global markets and where the main opportunity lies – UK equities. Mike Aked, Research Affiliates’ director of research for Australia, said last week (March 17) that the firm had identified […]
Ms Fixit to head up AMP
The chief executive-elect of AMP Limited, once a financial services giant in size and stature – boasting for a time the advertising slogan: ‘We will always be there’ – faces the biggest task of her career. Her track record could not be better. The advertising slogan sounded good, if overly ambitious, for its post-IPO times. The sector’s predilection for […]
Crisis, what crisis? Strong earnings for Aussie stocks
While it may be only short term, the Government’s stimulus measures over the past 12 months have helped Australia’s listed companies to their best half-yearly reporting season in ten years. In its latest report on the state of the companies following their shareholder reports for the six months to December, equities manager Martin Currie Australia […]
Aussie investors more bullish on the future
Individual investors in Australia are increasingly optimistic about the future for their own portfolios and the world in general – significantly more so than others in the region, according to a survey by PIMCO. The ‘PIMCO APAC Investor Sentiment Survey Q4 2020’ shows a surge in optimism compared with the same questions being asked for […]
Alternative thoughts on the value conundrum
This is not another “now is the time for value” story. Really. Perhaps the unique nature of the market’s record run in growth over value has been to do with our definition of value. Here are some alternative thoughts. According to a paper from Amundi Asset Management, ‘Do Not Give Up on Fundamental Valuations’, investors are struggling […]
Australian Ethical shoots for the stars
Australian Ethical, which is already the equal-largest manager of specialist ESG-related funds in Australia, alongside Vanguard, is now aiming to be among the largest of all managers with Australian businesses operating in the wholesale and retail space. And it is hoping technology will help. The manager (ASX: AEF) has partnered with a specialist start-up Alta […]
Competition hots up among ratings firms
Managed funds research and ratings start-up Foresight Analytics is expanding further in the ultra-competitive retail and advised investment sector through the acquisition of the analytics business of Australia Ratings Group. This follows a tie-up announced earlier this month with Style Analytics Group, a factor analysis firm with offices in Boston and London, which provides research […]
BetaShares eyes offshore growth with new partner
BetaShares has taken on a new cornerstone investor, TA Associates, as it enters its second decade in business, with founding partner Mirae Asset Management cashing in its chips. TA is arguably the largest growth-orientated global private equity firm with a specialty in financial services. TA, which has backed managers such as PIMCO and Invesco early […]
Morningstar award winners announced
Mark Arnold and Jason Orthman stood at the podium to collect three awards at last Friday (Feb 26) afternoon’s annual Morningstar funds awards, including the main prize, that of Fund Manager of the Year. But they didn’t quite scoop the pool. They were on stage four times but had to make way for T. Rowe […]
PIMCO caught in fake bond scam
PIMCO Australia last night (February 22) warned advisers nationally that its name had been used in bond scams which ASIC uncovered in January. They are “raising millions of dollars”, ASIC said. The scam, targeting Australian investors, involves an offer of unrealistically high returns on the supposed investment in bonds, which the big manager says are […]
Bryan Gray released after 32 years in custody
Bryan Gray, a genuine stalwart of, and major contributor to, the strong position of Australia and New Zealand’s asset servicing sector, has retired. He spent 12 years at State Street followed by nearly 20 years at J.P. Morgan. Gray is the only person to have been chair of the Australian Custodial Services Association twice, in […]
… as super ‘overdone’ – Ralston tells SMSF advisers
The switch in focus to retirement incomes, ahead of the introduction of the Retirement Income Covenant, was evident at the annual SMSF Association conference last week. Deborah Ralston said: “Super has been a bit overdone”. Ralston, one of the panellists on the Government’s Retirement Income Review (RIR), which handed down its report in July 2020, […]
Forget politics, retirement strategies the real battleground
People talk about the importance of taking the time to build a platform for any endeavour. If that’s the case for developing a commercial mass-market range of retirement solutions, Allianz and PIMCO have given themselves a head start with their platform – Allianz Retire+. Starting in 2015 in PIMCO’s Sydney office, the notion of putting […]
Performance benchmark a cloud on horizon for SMSFs
It may be a lull between storms but the SMSF Association has no major political battle to contend with at the moment, instead focusing on smaller issues to do with regulatory change and embarking on new research about small funds’ performance in case that becomes an issue in future. John Maroney, the association’s chief executive, […]
Milestone broadens pControl’s reach among big investors
Milestone Group has extended the rollout of its new pControl asset allocation offering to Asia-Pacific to service increasing demand due to greater complexities of front and middle-office requirements in the use of funds-of-funds and other third-party investment structures. The ‘pControl Asset Allocation’ product is based on the platform built by the Australian-bred global group’s pControl […]
Bitcoin: the nonsensical asset that makes sense for now
When a 25-year-old English fund manager with £21 billion (A$37 billion) under management discloses it had made a sizable investment in bitcoin, it is bound to give the institutionalisation of the cryptocurrency a big kick along. This is especially so when the manager regards bitcoin as a potential store of wealth and not an alternative […]
Orford achieves another milestone with lifetime annuity
After a lifetime in super administration, David Orford has realised another long-held ambition. This week he announced the final piece in what he believes is the best retirement solution in Australia, which will be manufactured in conjunction with Generation Life. Optimum Pensions, controlled by the Orford Foundation, which is the beneficiary of most of Orford’s […]
How WealthO2 added an ‘X factor’ in board restructure
A small coterie of now well-heeled technology entrepreneurs is responsible for much of the progress seen in that segment of the Australian investment advice landscape for the past 25-or-so years, mostly starting in the days of dial-up modems. Two of them have just joined the board of the latest financial adviser systems firm, the four-year-old […]
Platinum’s lead Asia manager resigns after top returns
Platinum Asset Management’s lead portfolio manager on its $5.2 billion Asia-ex Japan fund, Joseph Lai, resigned suddenly over the Christmas period and has left the firm. He had signed off, however, on a stellar year for the group’s top-performing strategy. Lai took over running the Asia ex-Japan managed fund (and the $492 million listed version) […]
Allen Partners brings bitcoin manager to Australia
Due to its open-source ethos, bitcoin has travelled an unconventional growth path. For starters, no-one seems to know who invented it (rumoured to be a Sydneysider, possible pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto) but what we know is when it will all end – in 104 years when the last bitcoin will be mined. Putting its start behind […]
Good and bad news for IOOF
The good news for IOOF (ASX: IFL) following the battering it took from shareholders last month is that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has approved its MLC takeover. The bad news is that the remaining class action against it has been funded. The ACCC said on Monday it would not oppose IOOF’s $1.4 […]
Alternative assets to hit $23 trillion by 2025
Assets in alternative investments are expected to grow by 9.8 per cent a year over the next five years, to hit US$17 trillion (A$23.4 trillion) by 2025, according to the latest research by Preqin, the global alternatives research and data provider. Private equity will double to US$9.1 trillion and Asia will be a “huge driver.” […]
Review offers up ammunition for super fight
There were no recommendations in the Retirement Income Review final report, and nor did there need to be. In the highly charged political environment around super, there was sufficient evidence for the Government to do what it wants. Michael Callaghan, the chair, and his two panelists, Carolyn Kay and Deborah Ralston, deliver more than 600 […]
SMSFs cheaper to run than ASIC says
SMSFs are not as expensive to operate as many, including ASIC and the Productivity Commission, have led us to believe, according to a report by consulting actuaries Rice Warner, and published to coincide with the start of ‘SMSF Week’. The report was commissioned by the SMSF Association (SMSFA) which has been continually irked by both […]
Managers prepare for market shift
While the big tech stocks have driven global as well as US share market growth for several years, questions are emerging about how long this will last; and where do investors go when the world is also awash with “low-to-no” interest rates? In a series of four webinars for fund managers with which it partners, […]
Managers queue to catch the quoted funds wave
Loftus Peak, Australian global equities boutique, has become the second manager to launch a “quoted managed fund.” This looks set to become a strong trend in retail distribution, with a host of managers lining up for the new form of listing and an extra administrator entering this part of the market, Link Fund Solutions. The […]
PineBridge sees opportunity in ESG
While investing following strong and integrated ESG principles does not readily spring to mind when considering China there is more action going on across the sustainability space there than many people think. The building blocks are already in place: a growing green credit market that is encouraging companies to invest in ESG-related projects, strategic government […]
Advisers should expect more changes with insurance
For many advisers, life insurance is an important part of their income. But unless the insurance sector changes its business lines, particularly with troublesome income protection products, they will all feel the pinch come the third quarter next year. The industry will have to re-cut its products, not just with income protection (IP) insurance, according […]
Retail investors smarter than you think
New retail investors entered the sharemarket in droves over the first six months of the pandemic’s impact. Contrary to widely held views, for the most part, on average, they did very well. Very well indeed. But one has to be careful of averages. They can often mask skews from big single numbers and rarely do […]
Chris Cuffe’s top 10 lessons revisited
Chris Cuffe first let the industry know, in 2015, what his 10 biggest lessons from years at the top in funds management were. He revisited and updated the list in September 2019 and has now done so once again. But the original list is probably timeless. He also added a few extra tips last week, […]
WTW takes on fund managers over diversity
Progress on diversity across the whole investment industry has remained disappointingly slow, according to a paper from Willis Towers Watson (WTW), the global investment consulting, funds management, and insurance broking firm. It has decided on direct engagement with fund managers to pick up the pace. In its paper published yesterday (October 26), entitled ‘Diversity in the […]
Plans for a simpler, cheaper advice system
The Financial Services Council (FSC) is to now prepare a policy discussion (a ‘green paper’) for the industry and government, to be delivered in 2021, following the release of a major report by Rice Warner proposing sweeping changes to Australia’s financial advice system. The Rice Warner report was commissioned by the FSC and discussed at […]
Governments hurt pensions adequacy
Australia has slipped from third place in the world rankings for adequacy, sustainability and integrity of our super system to fourth place, being leap-frogged by new entrant Israel. The impact of COVID-19 has cost almost all systems, particularly those which allowed access to savings or relaxed contributions rules. The Mercer CFA Institute 12th annual global […]
Hamish Douglass pours oil on troubled waters
Hamish Douglass, the CIO of Magellan Financial Group, who oversees the largest Australian-owned global funds manager and is the current darling of both the wholesale and retail investor sectors, is relatively sanguine about the possible market impact of the US election, but a bit more worried about COVID-19. Douglass, also Magellan’s co-founder, with Chris Mackay, […]
A game-changer for managed funds?
The launch early in February this year of Australia’s first unlisted fund to be quoted on the ASX, by Magellan group and its administrator, Mainstream, took a while to sink in, not helped by the dislocation caused by the pandemic crisis. But, as Australia at least, is preparing to get back to business at some […]
AMP on Listed Infrastructure
Notwithstanding the political and superannuation industry talk of an infrastructure-led economic recovery in Australia, and elsewhere, the listed infrastructure sector has been looking decidedly unloved of late. And much of the sector’s underperformance against the broader market this year has not been justified in terms of company earnings. Guiseppe Corona, the London-based head of global […]
Managed accounts growth beats predictions
In the middle of 2015, Morgan Stanley Research in Australia published a report which predicted that managed accounts would prove to be a major disruptor of traditional investing via managed funds/unit trusts. The report, ‘Evolution or Revolution?’, seemed overly bullish on the new way for individual investors and their advisers to access professional investment management. […]
JANA recruits from within for new insurance role
JANA Investment Advisers, Australia’s largest asset consulting firm, is expanding its insurance business, which until now has been most developed in the health insurance sector, with the creation of a new role as ‘head of insurance strategy’, to be filled by Greg Wilkinson. Wilkinson, currently a senior consultant and a member of JANA’s global equities […]
Russell on tech stock slump
Financial advisers around the world are rightly concerned about the state of markets, with record-high prices for both equities and bonds. As previously reported, according to an Investment Trends survey of Australian investors, there has been a jump in the frequency of communications between advisers and their clients in Australia since COVID-19 hit home in […]
Investors shrug off COVID blues
A clear correlation has emerged between risk appetite during the COVID-19 pandemic and the age of investors, with Australian ‘millennials’ – the cohort aged 24-39 – among the most proactive globally, according to a survey of 1,800 people in six countries. Australian investors of all ages are also among the most bullish globally. The survey […]
HESTA appoints Martin Currie for new partnership
Martin Currie Investment Management has formed a partnership for international equities with HESTA, the $52 billion health and related industries super fund.
Press Release – IMAP Announces 2020 Managed Account Awards Winners
The Institute of Managed Account Professionals (IMAP) today announced the winners of the 2020 IMAP Managed Account Awards. “We had a record number of entries this year. The quality and depth of the entries has again impressed our awards judging panel. It was a very close contest in each of the categories,” said Toby Potter […]