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A common perception amongst academics and investors is that factor premiums, like Momentum, Value and Low-risk, exists in equity markets and should be best harvested via both long and short positions. But a team of three quant researchers and portfolio managers at Robeco have critically assessed the added value of shorts positions to harvest equity factors, and contrary to general market consensus, have found that there are none.
David Blitz, Pim van Vliet and Guido Baltussen made a breakdown of common equity factor strategies into their long and short legs, and found that (i) most added value tends to come
Independent fund and corporate services provider, the Aztec Group, has appointed Virginia Rothwell as its first Chief People Officer.
Rothwell will drive the Group’s people agenda, while leading multi-jurisdictional HR, employee engagement and training teams. The appointment is effective immediately.
Rothwell joins the Aztec Group from real estate firm JLL where she held the position of UK HR Director since 2014. In this role, she sat on the JLL UK Board and led the firm’s people strategy.
Rothwell has enjoyed an international career in sectors such as technology, professional services and retail banking, where she has developed people agendas for
Nasdaq’s Quandl, an alternative data provider, has launched the E-Commerce Intelligence (ECI) dataset, which allows investors to track product-level e-commerce transactions on a near real-time basis.
The exclusive dataset follows the day-to-day transactions of 800 brands and 500 companies across more than 350 e-retailers in North America and EMEA, capturing USD15 billion worth of product sales annually.
ECI data is available daily with a seven-day lag, offering a distinct speed advantage over consumer sales datasets currently available on the market. Investors can monitor early traction on new products, follow the entire lifecycle of a product, monitor same-store sales and measure
Vistra, a global corporate service, trust and fund administration provider, has made three senior appointments to its global compliance team – Stephen Costello as Regional Compliance Director, Americas & Caribbean, Salima Fajal as Regional Compliance Director, Europe, and Nico Van Bockstal as Regional Compliance Director, India, Middle East and Africa – effective immediately.
Reporting to Vistra’s Chief Compliance Officer Tanya Scott-Tomlin, they will be responsible for the strategic direction and implementation of Vistra’s internal compliance strategy in the respective regions. In addition, Nico Van Bockstal also heads Vistra Middle East’s Governance, Risk, Compliance and Finance consultancy team which supports Middle
ROW Asset Management, a quantitative global macro investment firm founded in 2010, has hired Andy Schneider as Managing Director, Global Head of Business Development, effective immediately.
Schneider brings more than 18 years of investment management business development experience with over 10 years working within the systematic trading space. He will report to ROW’s Newport Beach, CA and New York City offices.
Previously, Schneider was Director of Business Development, North America for ISAM, a London-based systematic investment manager. Between 2009 and 2016, he worked at Campbell & Co, focusing on domestic institutional sales and consultant relations and from 2002 through 2008
By Michael Killourhy, Ogier – 2017 and 2018 were record setting years for Special Purpose Acquistion Company (SPAC) offerings in the United States. Strong demand continued into 2019, with SPAC IPOs crossing the 100 mark by end Q2 2019. SPACs are publicly-traded investment vehicles that raise funds via an IPO to complete a targeted acquisition (a “business combination”) within a limited time frame (18-24 months).
The funds raised are placed in an interest bearing trust account and may only be used to fund a business combination. If the company fails to complete a business combination, the funds are returned to investors
Since the Approved Manager Regulations were implemented in the BVI in 2012, smaller managers seeking a more simplified approval process and lighter touch regulatory framework compared to the Securities and Investment Business Act (SIBA) have really benefited.
Under the approved manager regime, start-up managers can choose to avail of the BVI’s incubator fund and approved fund products, both of which are designed to help build their track records without necessarily having to launch a BVI professional fund on day one.
In that sense, the approved manager enables smaller managers to establish a structure on a cost-effective basis, says Walter Reich
Interview with Jacques Roux (pictured), Managing Director, Audit, KPMG
How big an opportunity do you think technology innovation is for the BVI’s service provider community, broadly speaking?
The investment funds industry, like most other activities in the financial market space, is information intensive. Data is the lifeblood of alternative investments and, therefore, digitisation is already proving to be a key driver in the next wave of the investment fund industry’s growth. We fully believe that, ultimately, digitisation is going to have a similar effect on the alternative investment industry as the effect of the internet on the media content industry.
By Simon Gray, BVI Finance – A new generation of hedge fund managers are looking to make a name for themselves. But starting a fund, raising money and managing a back office can be a gruelling task even for the most talented rising stars.
The main challenge for a start-up hedge fund manager is that institutional investors are looking for a three-year track record before they even consider investing, while alternative sources of funding expect at least 12-18 months of experience.
So how do new fund managers go about achieving this track record without drowning under the operational costs and constraints of
By Christopher Simpson & Kerry Anderson – News outlets, including The Guardian and CNBC, were reporting and market watchers were opining in early 2019 that a slowing world economy forebodes a major global economic shift – possibly another recession. By mid-August, the concern found renewed attention when analysts pointed to an inverted yield curve in the United States Government bond market as a historical precursor to a recession.
According to Credit Suisse, a recession has occurred, on average, 22 months following such an inversion in past cycles. Whether the inverted yield curve is a reliable indicator of an imminent recession is
