Soon after Jon Glass joined Media Super as CIO in 2009, he found a “nice, clean sheet of paper” within the fund’s $2.6 billion portfolio. There was empty space where a hedge fund program would feasibly lie. The industry fund had recently terminated some hedge fundof- funds (hedge FoF) exposure. But now that Glass is familiar with the fund’s asset mix, the former mathematician and hedge fund specialist is concentrating on building an “opportunistic alternatives” program that will invest up to 5 per cent of Media Super’s portfolio in hedge fund and alternative investment strategies. “I’m looking for fund managers and strategies who can justifiably occupy this area,” he says.
Former GMO Oz equities chief resurfaces
The former head of Australian equities at GMO, who dramatically departed the manager in February, is building a new quant capability inside a major boutique incubator.
How to tap the emerging markets in a risk-appropriate manner, benchmarking, pension fund scale and the role of bonds in a portfolio were key concerns of some of the world’s largest pension and sovereign funds at a conference in Hong Kong last week. LGS seeks alpha from currency, beta of hedge funds
The $6 billion NSW Local Government Super (LGS) is up to due diligence on its first-ever active currency manager, has invested in a hedge fund beta strategy, and questioned whether it can continue to offer free financial advice to members following completion of the sale of its FuturePlus stake to Energy Industries Super Scheme.
Viva la reform: managers want reviews put into action
Australia’s proposed financial reforms will boost transparency, investor confidence and efficiency, a major survey of Australian funds managers and others active in the financial services industry, conducted by RBC Dexia Investor Services, has found.
Ankura gets nod as Russell seeks income
Russell Investments has allocated to BNY Mellon affiliate Ankura Capital for the first time, amid a host of new mandates supporting two new income-based multimanager funds for Australian equities and Australian bonds.
Find your place in evolving Asia
It’s an ambitious pitch that has as much likelihood of outrageous success as failure. Geoff Weir, head of the Financial Centre Task Force, will soon approach Asia-Pacific governments about establishing a multilateral ‘passport’ enabling the selling of managed funds in the region. This isn’t a plan to make Australia or any market a regional distribution hub: the collective undertaking aims to strengthen domestic industries by improving cross-border market access and letting them dictate the terms upon which the business of funds management is done in the region. This will be a long, hard slog for the task force.
Emerging markets: carve-outs on the rise
Australian institutional investors are increasingly carving out emerging markets coverage within their broad international equity portfolio, but there is little appetite yet for an ‘unconstrained’ approach to the asset class, according to Investec Asset Management. The South African-owned manager is well-placed to comment on buying patterns in the asset class, because its emerging markets capability grew out of its existing global equity team, following requests from clients. That means the 12-person global equity team, based in London, also runs Investec’s emerging markets and Asia ex- Japan funds, and as such does not subscribe to the need for analysts dotted around the globe.
