Funds
Lombard Odier Investment Managers (Lombard Odier IM) has appointed Arnaud Langlois to launch a global equity long/short investment strategy with a sustainability focus.
Arnaud Langlois and Cyrus Azarmgin, who have run the strategy together for seven years, join Lombard Odier IM as Portfolio Manager and Senior Analyst respectively. The strategy will launch in Q2 2018 with USD100m in committed capital.
Jean-Pascal Porcherot (pictured), CEO of Lombard Odier IM’s 1798 Alternative Platform, says: “There is high demand for long-short funds and strategies which incorporate responsible investment. This is an important milestone in strengthening our alternatives platform and reinforces Lombard Odier IM’s commitment to
Hedge funds recovered strongly last week from the recent stock selloff, with two exceptions: fixed income funds, flat this week; and neutral equity funds, still suffering from sector and factor rotations.
The risk-on sentiment though broadly supported hedge funds last week, with the Lyxor Hedge Fund Index up 1.4 per cent.
The more directional strategies outperformed. The L/S Equity variable bias index was up 1.2 per cent, fuelled by solid returns from Emerging and the highest beta- driven funds.
Special Situations funds outperformed from several of their hard-catalyst stocks delivering strong earnings. Merger Arbitrage thrived from their M&A
The VIX is not broken says Taylor Lukof of ABR Dynamic Funds. “There was an opportunity for the VIX to break on the 5th of February and here we are two weeks later and the VIX is at 18, down from 50, the markets are back up and the world is fine.
“A lot of people think that the market for VIX products could take down the entire equity market but while it is larger than when it launched, it is still relatively small when compared to the equity market – the tail is not wagging the dog.”
However, Lukof
2017 was an exceptional year for the European investment fund industry, with net assets of UCITS and AIF surpassing the EUR15 trillion mark and net sales breaking the prior record set in 2015 by more than EUR200 billion.
That’s according to the EFAMA 2018 annual review which reveals that all types of UCITS recorded strong net sales in 2017, with bond funds reaching their highest annual net sales ever.
Buoying stock markets, on the back of a cyclical upswing, increased investor confidence and boosted net inflows into equity funds.
The net sales of bond funds rebounded strongly in
Investors allocated about USD14.12 billion in new money to hedge funds in January and pushed overall hedge fund industry AUM to a new record of USD3.366 trillion, according to eVestment’s Hedge Fund Industry Asset Flow Report for January 2018.
Macro funds, long/short equity and directional credit strategies were big winners among primary strategies in January, while multi-strategy funds and event driven funds saw AUM fall by USD3.34 billion and USD1.73 billion respectively.
China-focused funds received among the largest new allocations and largest redemptions to begin 2018. Investors appear less enamoured by equity exposure to the country and allocations were concentrated within Chinese debt-focused
Wealthfront has launched Risk Parity, the latest addition to PassivePlus, the company’s signature suite of investment features, which is designed to replicate Bridgewater Associates’ All Weather Fund.
PassivePlus represents Wealthfront’s collection of academically proven, time tested rules-based strategies that seek to increase clients’ net of fee, after-tax returns, while maintaining their same level of risk. Risk Parity joins Wealthfront’s previous PassivePlus features, daily tax-loss harvesting, stock-level tax-loss harvesting and Smart Beta as impactful capabilities.
“Wealthfront’s PassivePlus marries decades of academic insights with technology to deliver a disciplined investment approach that helps our clients achieve their financial goals,” says Dr Jakub Jurek,
Imagineer Technology Group, a provider of investor relations and fund marketing software to the asset management industry, and Synap Software Labs, a provider of cloud-based investment research, due diligence, and account management applications, are to merge.
The combined business will operate under the Imagineer name.
“Since our founding in 1998, Imagineer has been committed to transforming the way fund marketing and relationship management professionals engage with and service their clients,” says Erol Dusi (pictured), founder of Imagineer, who will continue to serve as President of the company. “We are excited to join forces with the Synap team whose rich
Online multi-asset trading and investment specialist Saxo Bank has reported a positive net profit of DKK401 million for 2017, an increase of 33 per cent compared to 2016.
Client collateral deposits continued to rise to DKK103.6 billion while the operating income for the group was DKK3.0 billion, a three per cent increase compared to 2016.
Saxo Bank Group has continued to strengthen its capital position with the total capital ratio for the Group reaching 22.7 per cent as of the end of 2017 compared to 19.5 per cent at the end of 2016, thus retaining a comfortable buffer.
The SS&C GlobeOp Forward Redemption Indicator for February 2018 measured 2.71 per cent, up from 2.20 per cent in January.
“SS&C GlobeOp’s Forward Redemption Indicator for February 2018 was 2.71 per cent, reflecting improvement from the 3.25 per cent reported for the same period a year ago for February of 2017. This marks the 13th consecutive month of year-over-year improvement in redemption notices,” says Bill Stone (pictured), Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, SS&C Technologies. “In fact, the 2.71 per cent reported for February 2018 is the lowest rate of redemption notices for any calendar month of February since the inception of
SYZ Asset Management (SYZ AM) has expanded its offering of quantitative solutions through the launch of OYSTER Equity Premia Global.
This new offering builds on the strong success of the OYSTER Market Neutral Europe fund and will similarly seek to deliver alpha-rich returns while aiming to maintain a near zero equity beta over time. In order to support initial asset growth and reward early investors, a one-year discount of 50 per cent on the management fees will be offered.
While investing in equity premia is nothing new, the approach taken by SYZ AM to ‘harvest’ inefficiencies in equity markets
