Global ETF News Older than One Year
Europe a new focus for boutique managers says SunGard/TABB survey
Monday 13, 2015--Boutique asset managers are increasingly losing their home country bias in the search for investment growth, in particular switching into Europe in 2015 despite the recent issues in Greece, according to a survey of over 100 fund managers by independent capital markets research firm TABB Group for SunGard.
"We are seeing confident and positive boutique asset managers who are using their greater focus and agility, as well as more flexible systems, to carve out profitable niches despite tougher regulation. What is interesting is their investment focus, with European equities at the forefront and ETFs increasingly used as an efficient base for focused portfolio construction," says Trevor Headley, head of product management of SunGard's boutique asset management business.
Towers Watson Global Alternatives Survey 2015
Including the top alternative asset manager rankings
July 13, 2015--
At a Glance
In 2014, alternative assets under management hit $6.3 trillion.
Real estate managers have the largest share of alternative assets under control at 33%.
Pension fund assets represent 33% of the Top 100 alternative managers' assets.
This year's Global Alternatives Survey, produced in conjunction with the Financial Times, shows that the total global alternative assets under management hit $6.3 trillion (up from $5.7 trillion in 2013).
Of the Top 100 alternative investment managers, real estate managers have the largest share of assets (33% and over $1 trillion), followed by hedge funds (23% and $791bn), private equity fund managers (22% and $767bn), private equity funds of funds (10% and $342bn), funds of hedge funds (5% and $214bn), infrastructure (4%) and illiquid credit (3%).
view the Towers Watson Global Alternatives Survey 2015
Source: Powers Watson
Barclays Partners With 'Dr. Doom' for Global Stock Indexes
July 13, 2015--U.K. banking giant Barclays (UK: BARC) is teaming up with Nouriel Roubini on factor-based stock indexes.
Four Roubini Barclays Country Insights Indices were developed by Roubini Global Economics and Barclays' structured investment strategies group, according to a press release issued on Monday.
Source: Barron's
Flash Boys Welcome: World Exchanges Woo High-Frequency Firms
July 12, 2015--Hey there, flash boy.
Exchanges around the world are avidly wooing high-frequency traders- those controversial speed demons of Wall Street.
Despite the often explosive debate over this kind of trading in the U.S., bourses in Mexico, Turkey, South Africa and beyond are trying to lure HFT types to boost business.
Source: Bloomberg
China's market-tracking ETFs roiled by share suspensions
July 12, 2015--A wave of stock suspensions has played havoc with exchange traded funds tracking Chinese markets, causing wild price swings and big price gaps between passive funds and the assets they track.
More than 1,400 companies-more than half of all listings-are on trading halts in China, in an effort to shield themselves from the dramatic equity market sell-off that has wiped trillions of dollars off the value of Chinese stocks.
Source: FT.com
Beyond Greece, the world is filled with debt crises
Drama in Athens reflects a bigger truth: precarious countries across the globe owe trillions of dollars to lenders and investors who must be repaid
July 11, 2015--With its shuttered banks, furious public protests and iconoclastic politicians, the plight of Greece, brought to its knees by a crippling debt burden, has been gripping and heartbreaking in equal measure: a full-blown sovereign debt crisis on the doorstep of some of the wealthiest countries in the world.
Yet new analysis by the Jubilee Debt Campaign reveals that Greece’s plight is far from unique: more than 20 other countries are also wrestling with their own debt crises.
Source: The Guardian
BRICS Bank To Start Lending In Local Currencies In Q1 2016, President Says
July 10, 2015--The $100 billion New Development Bank (NDB), also known as the BRICS bank, which comprises of the members of the BRICS grouping of emerging market nations-Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa-will start lending in local currency by April 2016 and its member countries will be the primarily
focus of the bank, K.V. Kamath, the President of the NDB told the Press Trust of India (PTI) on Friday.
Source: emergingequity.org
BlackRock tries to calm redemption fears
July 10, 2015--BlackRock, the largest asset manager in the world, is pushing back against mounting concern that asset managers are set for severe investor outflows when interest rates eventually begin to rise.
Like many asset managers, BlackRock has ballooned in size by hoovering up corporate bonds as companies have taken advantage of low interest rates to issue large amounts of debt.
Source: FT.com
FSB Sees Progress on Risk-Free Interest-Rate Benchmarks
July 9, 2015--Global regulators are making progress in identifying potential risk-free benchmark rates as they respond to manipulation scandals that have shaken the financial industry, the Financial Stability Board said.
"Detailed data collection exercises have been undertaken in key markets and work is now underway to identify potential" risk-free benchmark rates where these don't exist, the Basel-based FSB said in a report on Thursday."
Source: Bloomberg
IMF Slower Growth in Emerging Markets, a Gradual Pickup in Advanced Economies WEO Update
July 9, 2015--Global growth is projected at 3.3 percent in 2015, marginally lower than in 2014, with a gradual pickup in advanced economies and a slowdown in emerging market and developing economies.
In 2016, growth is expected to strengthen to 3.8 percent. A setback to activity in the first quarter of 2015, mostly in North America, has resulted in a small downward revision to global growth for 2015 relative to the April 2015 World Economic Outlook (WEO).
Nevertheless, the underlying drivers for a gradual acceleration in economic activity in advanced economies-easy financial conditions, more neutral fiscal policy in the euro area, lower fuel prices, and improving confidence and labor market conditions-remain intact.
In emerging market economies, the continued growth slowdown reflects several factors, including lower commodity prices and tighter external financial conditions, structural bottlenecks, rebalancing in China, and economic distress related to geopolitical factors. A rebound in activity in a number of distressed economies is expected to result in a pickup in growth in 2016.
view the lower Growth in Emerging Markets, a Gradual Pickup in Advanced Economies - Infographic
Source: IMF
