Financial Times Mandate articles from October 2008

Financial Times Mandate archives from October 2008

Analysis: Keeping an eye on longer term trends.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Yuri Bender While the first concern of institutional investors may be making sure their liquidity funds are safe and secure, they should not ignore longer term investment trends, despite the current "ferocious economic climate,"...

Analysis: The changing face of prime brokerage.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Henry Smith With the credit crunch having wiped out almost an entire community of investment bank broker-dealers, is a new prime brokerage model emerging from the wreckage? According to Sunil Chadda, principal consultant at...

Analysis: Market analysis - Europe.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Alice Breheny As global economic conditions have deteriorated, there has been a sharp fall- off in cross-border property investment resulting in weaker performance and divergence of market pricing. To date performance has been...

News in brief.
October 1, 2008... 1-in-10 hedge fund managers are not covering their costs with management fees, according to a survey by KPMG for PCE Investors. The average fund spends 45 per cent of management fees are spent on costs - even excluding front office salaries...

Analysis: Market analysis - North America.(Market overview)
October 1, 2008... Byline: John M. Balder The debt-driven real estate boom appears to have come to a close. From 2000 to 2007, mortgage-related borrowing by US households more than doubled to $10,500bn (7760bn), with much of it securitized in novel...

Analysis: Hedge fund anger at short-selling bans.
October 1, 2008... The Alternative Investment Management Association (AIMA) reacted critically to the temporary short-selling bans introduced by finance regulators from September 17. The industry body was angry that the Financial Services Authority's (FSA)...

Analysis: Funds may face radical changes.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Nat Mankelow The money market fund industry could be facing crucial changes to the way its fund portfolios are managed to ensure daily liquidity and stable net asset value, a new report suggests. Money market funds have faced...

Analysis: Market analysis - South America.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Jerome Booth Though not perhaps immediately obvious, Latin America is positioned to benefit from the credit crunch. The most important and positive medium term impact for the region, as for other emerging markets, is likely to be a...

Analysis: Market analysis - Asia Pacific.
October 1, 2008... Byline: James Wier Asia ex Japan remains in good health economically, because we believe there is still significant balance sheet strength at the country, company and household levels. This strength has been aided by a cultural tendency to...

Analysis: Time for pump priming?
October 1, 2008... As recession drags on the public sector purse it could provide new opportunities for private infrastructure investors, according to two leading fund managers. Stephen Vineburg, infrastructure CEO at CVC Capital Partners, has likened...

Analysis: Lehman's defaulted CDS near settlement.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Nat Mankelow The auction to determine the final payout on $400bn (291bn) of defaulted credit default trades referencing failed investment bank Lehman Brothers could see a net $6bn transferred from sellers to buyers of credit...

Analysis: First test for LDI structures.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Martin Steward The collapse of Lehman Brothers and ensuing turmoil in investment banking presents the first major test for swaps-based liability-driven investment (LDI) structures bought by pension funds. With breakeven...

Comment: Leader - Are new forecasts just wishful thinking?
October 1, 2008... Byline: Henry Smith, editor Given the stomach-churning roller-coaster ride that investors have suffered on the stock markets this year, on one level it is not at all surprising to learn that institutional asset managers are predicting...

Comment: The Consulting Room - Give low-volatility a chance.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Brendan Bradley In the current environment of extreme market volatilility, it is not surprising that many equity investors have headed for the exit.However, a largely overlooked strategy could help those with longer-term investment...

Comment: The Bender Agenda - The fox and the professor.(SGAM AI built up fund management franchise in Asia)(Editorial)
October 1, 2008... Byline: Yuri Bender, editor in chief Just four years ago, the European investment management industry was dominated by a handful of fascinating, but very different personalities. Among these were two French fund bosses, who between them...

Comment: Soapbox - The challenges facing Ucits.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Jon Brassey The publication in July of the European Commission's proposed revision to the legislative framework for Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities (Ucits) marked another step on the road towards...

Interview: The chief - A baptism of fire.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Nat Mankelow The Jay Ireland story could make classic primetime television. Whether retelling the story of a young field artillery officer in the US Army stationed in West Germany at the height of the Cold War, or as head of GE-...

Interview: FTM interview - The courage of conviction.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Martin Steward George Anson has some thoughts on the vexed question of fair-value accounting. How can it be "fair" that a company bought by a private equity fund on a six-year view 18 months ago, well within debt covenants and...

Features: Cover story - Pension buyout - Buyout boom fuelled by need for protection.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Martin Steward The pensions buyout market has been totally transformed since Paternoster entered the fray with GBP500m (642m) of committed investor capital in June 2006. Until then it had been a sleepy GBP2bn-a-year business aimed...

Features: Cover story - Dutch courage brings fiduciary to the UK.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Spencer Anderson Fiduciary management giant Mn Services' decision to enter the UK market earlier this summer was inevitable. The all-encompassing concept has taken off in the Netherlands, where the firm has raked in 58bn. Mn...

Features: Cover story - The alternatives one-stop shop.(BlackRock Inc.)(Cover story)
October 1, 2008... Byline: Martin Steward Alternative investments can be a fruitful source of both alpha and "exotic" beta, but allocations are high-maintenance. "Pretty much every conversation with clients on alternatives ends up in the same place," says...

Features: Strategies - Private equity - Diversifying to achieve consistent returns.(Company overview)
October 1, 2008... Byline: Martin Steward "Pension funds need to deliver absolute returns over many years, and many more could benefit from allocating to more illiquid assets instead of hanging on to liquidity for reasons that are not entirely rational for...

Features: Strategies - Commodities - The diverse benefits of commodities.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Matthew Craig Just as it is hard to disentangle the various factors behind the global credit crunch, so the current popularity of commodities among investors has a multiplicity of causes. Having said that, in the same way that...

Features: Strategies - Commodities - The case for active investing in commodities.
October 1, 2008... Institutional investment in commodities has risen dramatically as the asset class has become recognised for its compelling investment attributes - namely strong returns which are uncorrelated to core assets like equities and bonds, and...

Features: Strategies - Foreign exchange - The case for active currency management.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Alison Ebbage With a negative correlation to other asset classes, there is surely a good argument for an investment manager to be involved in a currency play, especially in such turbulent times. But surprisingly the market in...

Features: Strategies - Volatility - Putting market volatility to work.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Gerry O'Kane The one consistency the markets have been showing in recent months is volatility. Where there is movement, the investment sector finds opportunity and in recent years volatility trading has found a ready market amongst...

Features: Strategies - High yield bonds - Wide spreads tempt investors back in.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Ceri Jones Spreads on high yield bonds have widened to a record 1200 basis points, an increase of around 350 basis points through the month of September. On one day (2 October) they rose 76 points - the biggest leap since September...

Features: Strategies - Exchange-traded funds - ETF platform - A passport to Africa.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Nat Mankelow Achieving exposure to a resource and commodity-rich pan-African market can often be hindered by a lack of liquidity and relatively steep costs of access, especially via single-manager funds. However the launch this...

Features: Strategies - Exchange-traded funds - Managing liquidity.
October 1, 2008... FT Mandate: How does a market making specialist for exchange traded funds and exchange traded commodities facilitate the liquidity process especially in light of recent financial stresses in the market? Bernardus Roelofs: We have an...

Features: Performance - Equity technology - Fund performance overview - Technical knockout.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Martin Steward "It's different this time" usually sets alarm bells ringing. As far as the tech sector is concerned, it had better be different this time: last time the market crashed tech stocks led the stampede, dropping 80 per...

Technology: OTC derivatives - Clearing things up for the buyside.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Nat Mankelow The middle of September should have been a time of peace and contentment for the OTC derivatives market. It was in the process of establishing robust risk management procedures to cope with fast volume growth,...

Technology: Hedge fund administration - Rise of illiquid assets changing the field.
October 1, 2008... Byline: Henry Smith As current market conditions force hedge fund managers to forsake the popular long/short equity strategy in favour of illiquid assets such as distressed debt, mortgage-backed securities and home loans, are specialist...