Mercer IC wins swag of new business

Mercer Investment Consulting has won a number of new contracts from various investment bodies.

The new clients include: ANZ lenders mortgages, New South Wales Lifetime Care and Support Authority (LCSA), the $360 million Uniting Church Beneficiary Fund and Legal Services Board of Victoria. The LCSA, a division of the Motor Accidents Authority, runs the Lifetime Care and Support Scheme (LCSS), which provides medical treatment and rehabilitation care to people seriously injured in motor accidents. Such patients have usually incurred spinal or moderate to severe brain injuries, serious burns or amputations. Simon Officer, LCSA chief financial officer, said the scheme’s $50 million in funds under management was expected to grow to $1.4 billion within 5 years. The scheme was established in July 2006 and appointed Mercer as its first asset consultant. Officer said Mercer showed “a clear understanding of the market and our needs…[and] the importance of creating an investment base that matches the duration of our liabilities while having a proportion of assets in active classes”. “Some consultants tried to drop us in a bucket with other players.” Since LCSA is a government organ, it invests primarily with the NSW Treasury Corporation (TCorp), which plays a major role in managing investments and liabilities for the government. LCSS is being deployed in two phases. While severely injured children were first admitted for treatment on 1 October 2006, all severely injured people will be eligible for treatment from 1 October 2007. Simon Eagleton, Mercer Investment Consulting principal, said the global consultant had expanded its services to accommodate the disparate needs of institutional investors. Such services include: dynamic asset allocation, responsible investment, reviews of back and middle-offices and customised services to investors in the insurance and not-for-profit sectors.