Global ETF News Older than One Year
Actividades de Construccion y Servicios S.A. Of Spain Added To Dow Jones Global Select Dividend Index
June 25, 2012--Actividades de Construccion y Servicios S.A. will be added to the Dow Jones Global Select Dividend Index, Dow Jones Indexes announced today.
The addition of Actividades de Construccion y Servicios S.A. follows the removal of Portugal’s CIMPOR-Cimentos de Portugal S.G.P.S. S.A., which is being removed due to its acquisition by Camargo Correa (Brazil).
Headquartered in Madrid, Spain, Actividades de Construccion y Servicios S.A. is a holding company primarily engaged through its subsidiaries in construction and engineering.
Source: Dow Jones Indexes
It's time to break the vicious cycles, says BIS in 82nd Annual Report
June 24, 2012--Those hoping for quick fixes to the strains in the global economy will continue to be disappointed, writes the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) in its 82nd Annual Report, released today.
Five years on from the outbreak of the financial crisis, and the global economy is still unbalanced, seemingly becoming more so as interacting weaknesses continue to amplify each other. The goals of balanced growth, balanced economic policies and a safe financial system still elude us.
The Report points out that the financial sector, governments, and households and firms need to repair their balance sheets: "the financial sector needs to recognise losses and recapitalise; governments must put fiscal trajectories on a sustainable path; and households and firms need to deleverage. As things stand, each sector's burdens ... are worsening the position of the other two."
view the BIS Annual Report 2011/2012
Source: BIS
Why Are So Many Top Executives Leaving BlackRock?
June 23, 2012--A series of high-level departures from BlackRock this month has raised questions about the direction of the world's largest money manager.
Coming in rapid succession over the past two weeks, the departures included Susan Wagner, a founding partner and vice chairman, who will retire at the end of June, and Robert Capaldi, who has already left and was senior client strategist for Chief Executive Laurence Fink.
Source: CNBC
Morgan Stanley shifted derivatives in first quarter
June 22, 2012--Morgan Stanley (MS.N) shifted more of its derivatives positions to its U.S. bank unit in the first quarter, as credit rating downgrades from Moody's Investors Service weighed on its business, data from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency showed on Friday.
Moody's downgraded 15 of the world's largest banks on Thursday and cut Morgan Stanley's unsecured debt rating two notches to Baa1, the third lowest investment grade.
Ratings in the Baa tier can be detrimental for banks with large capital markets operations because they can reduce the number of counterparties willing to trade with the firm and also increase the amount of collateral banks need to back trades.
Source: Reuters
IMF Working paper-Systemic Banking Crises Database: An Update
June 22, 2012--Summary: We update the widely used banking crises database by Laeven and Valencia (2008, 2010) with new information on recent and ongoing crises, including updated information on policy responses and outcomes (i.e. fiscal costs, output losses, and increases in public debt).
We also update our dating of sovereign debt and currency crises. The database includes all systemic banking, currency, and sovereign debt crises during the period 1970-2011. The data show some striking differences in policy responses between advanced and emerging economies as well as many similarities between past and ongoing crises.
view the IMF Working paper-Systemic Banking Crises Database: An Update
Source: IMF
La Francaise AM and S&P Capital IQ sign a strategic partnership
June 22, 2012--La Française AM, an asset management firm with both a securities and real estate expertise, has partnered with the Global Markets Intelligence (GMI) team at S&P Capital IQ in order to establish a global credit expertise and expand its investor-driven business development.
For both La Française AM and S&P Capital IQ, this partnership reflects an ambitious strategy for business development and innovation by leveraging the 35 year track record of La Francaise AM in asset management and distribution and the unique data and analytics of GMI (Global Markets Intelligence), a unit of S&P Capital IQ.
Source: RFP Connect
S&P Indices Launches Shariah Index with the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation
New Index Meets the Increasing Demand for a Shariah-Compliant Benchmark in Islamic Countries
June 22, 2012--S&P Indices announced today the launch of the S&P/OIC COMCEC 50 Shariah
Index, which is designed to measure the performance of 50 leading Shariah-compliant companies from the
member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). The Index has been designed in partnership with the OIC.
Companies from all 19 countries and territories whose exchanges are members of the OIC Exchanges and are covered by S&P Indices are eligible for the Index. These are: Bahrain, Bangladesh, Cote d'Ivoire, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Malaysia, Morocco, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.
Source: Standard & Poor's
NASDAQ Closing Cross Calculates U.S. Russell Indexes for the Ninth Year During Russell's Annual Reconstitution
June 22, 2012--The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. (Nasdaq:NDAQ) today announced the NASDAQ Closing Cross was used for the ninth consecutive year to rebalance NASDAQ-listed securities in the entire family of U.S. Russell indexes during their annual reconstitution.
Approximately 687.9 billion shares representing $9.5 billion were executed in the Closing Cross in 1.15 seconds across some 2,195 NASDAQ-listed stocks.
NASDAQ official closing prices (NOCPs) determined by the NASDAQ Closing Cross are widely used throughout the industry, by Russell Investments, Standard & Poor's, Dow Jones, and mutual funds across the country. The NASDAQ Closing Cross mechanism provides market participants with transparency and consistent prices with the dissemination of imbalances, indicative and likely clearing prices every five seconds via the Net Order Imbalance Indicator. NASDAQ OMX's INET technology platform processes accurate closing prices for the industry in microseconds.
Source: NASDAQ OMX
EPFR Global Fund Data News-Prospect of more quantitative easing offers some comfort in a cold investment climate
June 22, 2012--Going into the final week of 2Q12 there was no shortage of things for investors to worry about, among them slowing growth in China and Germany, Spain's banking woes, corporate profit warnings and signs of weakness in the US economy.
But flows in and out of EPFR Global-tracked funds suggested that a significant number of those investors see today’s bad news as tomorrow’s new round of quantitative easing. Flows into High Yield Bond Funds jumped to a seven week high, Equity Funds overall posted back-to-back weekly inflows for the first time since mid-March, redemptions from US Investment Grade Bond Funds hit a 13 week high and Mortgage Backed Bond Funds took in fresh money for the 67th straight week.
Visit http://www.epfr.com for more info
Source: EPFR
BlackRock protects iShares ETFs from stock lending
BlackRock, the investment group that owns iShares, has taken steps to remove the risk from stock lending in its exchange traded funds (ETFs).
June 22, 2012--BlackRock has announced two measures to reduce investor anxiety over the practice of stock lending by its iShares exchange traded funds (ETFs).
BlackRock has said it will indemnify its iShares ETF range from the risk of a borrower default. This means that if a company borrows stock from an iShares ETF and then goes bust and is unable to return the stock, BlackRock will compensate the fund and ensure there is no financial loss for investors.
Source: CityWire
