ConsulTree opening in Argentina - Courtesy Photo. ConsulTree Celebrates the Opening of a New Office in Argentina
ConsulTree International, a Leadership and Talent Development consulting founded in United States announced the opening of a new office in Argentina as the most recent expansion of ConsulTree International’s presence in Latin America.
The launch ceremony was held two weeks ago at the exclusive Palacio Duhau in Buenos Aires, with a Cocktail reception attended by a selected group of human resources professionals.
The local partners, Eduardo Cappello -managing director for the new office, with over 17 years in the business- and Paula Valente -Senior Consultant and Partner, Human Resources & Talent Development Specialist, with over 15 years of experience in leadership roles-, joined Luisa Guzman, CEO of ConsulTree International, who spoke about the New Global Trends in Development.
The opening of the Argentina office comes in response to proven demand from the existing client base comprised of multinationals based in South Florida for extended service in the region. “We are excited to lead the expansion of ConsulTree through a local presence in Argentina” said Luisa Guzman.
Guzman, with over 20 years of experience in Management Consulting, Human Resources, Organizational Development, Talent Acquisition and Leadership Development, is the founder of ConsulTree whose headquarters is in Miami and is present in Peru, Chile, Honduras, United Kingdom and Spain.
CC-BY-SA-2.0, FlickrPhoto: Portobay Hotels. Advisors More Likely to Join Existing RIA Firm Than Start Their Own Firm
The latest research from global analytics firm Cerulli Associates finds that advisors are more likely to join an existing registered investment advisor (RIA) firm, rather than start their own independent firm.
“Many advisors are daunted by the task of forging their own path and the accompanying headaches,” states Bing Waldert, director at Cerulli. “Advisors considering the RIA channel are increasingly looking to join existing firms that can provide them with not only the necessary operational infrastructure, but also a sense of community.”
Cerulli’s fourth quarter 2015 issue of The Cerulli Edge-Advisor Edition explores recruiting and retention, looking closely at the factors influencing advisors to switch firms, and the demand for support and flexibility in terms of how the advisors choose to conduct business.
“A variety of platforms and support organizations have emerged to provide advisors with different ways to run their practices,” Waldert explains. “The rise of the Subaggregator is happening for two reasons. The first, as has been noted, is providing an option for advisors interested in the independent business model, but without the skills or desire to operate their own business. The second and unique reason for the rise of these firms centers on the culture and community of being part of a smaller organization.”
“Cerulli is naming this class of firms the Subaggregators because their business model in many cases escapes traditional definitions of broker/dealers (B/Ds), RIAs, or office of supervisory jurisdiction (OSJs). They use the platform of a larger firm, such as a B/D or custodian, that more frequently works directly with advisors,” Waldert continues. “These firms support multiple advisory practices, with advisors operating autonomously, often across multiple geographies. They have professional leadership in place. Perhaps most importantly, the advisor’s primary relationship is with the Subaggregator rather than the B/D, custodian, or platform. Advisors are recognizing this evolution and believe the rise of Subaggregators is the next generation of financial firms.”
Foto: Zaheer Mohiuddin
. La proliferación de productos de beta estratégico añade complejidad al panorama de ETPs
“The strategic-beta landscape is growing faster than both the broader ETP market as well as the global asset management industry, driven by new inflows, new product launches, and the entrance of new providers during the past year. Benchmarks underlying new products are more complex as well,” Ben Johnson, Morningstar’s director of global exchange-traded funds research, said. “As strategic-beta strategies continue to proliferate and become increasingly nuanced, investors’ due-diligence burden is growing commensurately.”
At its sixth annual ETF Conference in Chicago, Morningstar published “A Global Guide to Strategic-Beta Exchange-Traded Products,” its second annual global landscape report about trends in strategic-beta exchange-traded products (ETPs). The company defines strategic beta as a class of investment products that track indexes that seek to either improve performance or alter the level of risk relative to a standard benchmark, representing a fast-growing middle ground on the active-to-passive investment spectrum.
The firm´s global report also reports that the number of strategic-beta ETPs in its database rose from 673 to 844, from June 30, 2014 to June 30, 2015. Worldwide assets rose from $396 billion to $497 billion during the same time period.
Strategic-beta ETPs account for 21.2 percent of U.S. ETP assets, which is the largest strategic-beta ETP market, and 2.9 percent of ETP assets in the Asia-Pacific region, the smallest market, compared with 19 and 1.5 percent, respectively, a year ago.
Dividend screened/weighted ETPs are again the most popular among strategic-beta ETPs by assets in all regions examined in the report except for the Asia-Pacific region. Quality strategies are the largest subset of strategic-beta ETPs in the Asia-Pacific region, representing $3.8 billion and 55.4 percent of total assets in strategic-beta ETPs as of June 30, 2015.
There is a positive relationship between the adoption of strategic-beta ETPs and the stage of development of a region’s ETP market as well as its asset management and financial services industries at large. For example, the United States has the second-oldest ETP market in the world, holding 52 percent of strategic-beta ETPs, which account for nearly 91 percent of total assets in the global strategic-beta ETP landscape.
United States: The top 10 strategic-beta ETPs by assets account for approximately 42 percent of the United States’ strategic-beta ETP market. iShares and Vanguard account for 16.5 percent of the total number of strategic-beta ETPs, holding 57.4 percent of assets in the United States.
Europe: Assets under management in strategic-beta ETPs rose by 18.6 percent in the last 12 months to $32.1 billion as of June 30, 2015. Strategic-beta ETPs’ share of the broader European ETP market expanded from 5.7 percent to 6.3 percent in the same period.
Emerging Markets: South Africa and Brazil are the main emerging markets in the strategic-beta ETP landscape. Neither market saw strategic-beta ETP launches in the last year. The single strategic-beta ETP in Brazil saw its assets under management decline by 50 percent from June 30, 2014 to June 30, 2015.
Foto de www.gotcredit.com. ¿Cuáles son las principales diferencias entre los ETFs de bonos y acciones?
An Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) is an investment tool, which combines the features of both mutual funds and stocks, providing multiple benefits such as diversification, liquidity and transparency. Like a mutual fund, an ETF is a collection of individual stocks or bonds that track a predefined index. Like a stock, ETFs trade on exchanges and can be bought or sold throughout the day. These features provide investors with an easy-to-use, low cost and tax efficient way to invest your money.
Originating in 1993, the first ETFs originally followed only equity indexes. It wasn’t until a decade later that Bond ETFs started to appear. While Equity and Bond ETFs display the same structural characteristics and have many things in common—typically tracking a diversified index and trading on exchanges—there are some key differences, because of the fundamental difference in stock and bond markets.
Stocks trade on exchanges, making them simple to access and value. Bonds on the other hand, trade over-the-counter (OTC). Prices are negotiated privately between buyers and sellers leading to a lack of price transparency. It can also be difficult for investors to find the bonds they want to buy. So how does this impact the management and valuation of Equity and Bond ETFs?
The objective of an ETF portfolio manager (PM) is to track the performance of the ETFs target index as closely as possible. For a simple equity index such as the S&P 500, PMs will hold all the securities in the respective weights as the index. The ability to access the constituent securities can be more difficult for broader, or less liquid indexes, i.e. the MSCI Emerging Market IMI index. Tracking a bond index adds another layer of complexity. The nature of the bond market makes it extremely difficult to exactly follow the index’s composition. Due to the enormous number of issuers and bonds within the US Aggregate bond index, bond ETF Portfolio Managers use a “sampling” approach wherein they aim to replicate the risk and return characteristics of the index using a smaller portfolio of available bonds. Large managers are able to leverage economies of scale and bond desk relationships, alleviating the legwork of tracking down bonds and simultaneously seeking to ensure fair pricing for investors.
The second main difference between Equity and Bond ETFs is the way they calculate underlying value. Price transparency in stock markets allows the price of an Equity ETF to be aligned to the value of the underlying basket of stocks, both during the day and at the close. Bond ETFs on the other hand, are often forced to rely on an estimate of Bond prices, as there’s typically no central market where investors can see where bonds were bought and sold—remember that on top of not necessarily trading every day, bonds tradeover-the-counter (OTC). This means that Bond ETF prices and the NAV values tend to deviate more than Equity ETFs, but keep in mind that NAV in the fixed income world is a best effort estimate and not necessarily an actionable price that investors could use to transact in the underlying securities. The reality is that market price of a bond ETF represents the price at which the underlying bonds can actually be traded at any given moment, derived by buyers and sellers transacting in a transparent investment tool.
The benefits Bond ETFs bring to markets have been immense. Bond ETFs have provided a price discovery tool that simply did not exist in Bond markets before. When we talk about how innovative bond ETFs are, this is what we’re referring to.
This material is for educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice nor an offer or solicitation to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy any shares of any Fund (nor shall any such shares be offered or sold to any person) in any jurisdiction in which an offer, solicitation, purchase or sale would be unlawful under the securities law of that jurisdiction. If any funds are mentioned or inferred to in this material, it is possible that some or all of the funds have not been registered with the securities regulator in any Latin American and Iberian country and thus might not be publicly offered within any such country. The securities regulators of such countries have not confirmed the accuracy of any information contained herein.
According to the latest monthly snapshot of European fund flow trends (data as at end September 2015) from Thomson Reuters, while the European funds industry faced estimated net outflows of €17 billion from long-term mutual funds for September, the ten best selling funds that month gathered net inflows of €13.1 billion.
BlackRock ICS Institutional USD Liquidity Core Acc was the best selling individual fund for September, netting €1.7 billion inflows. In total, the ten best selling funds – seven money market products, three equity funds and one mixed-asset fund- gathered net inflows of €10.3 billion for September.
Mixed-asset funds, with net inflows of €2 billion, were the best selling asset class overall, followed by alternative UCITS products, which added €1.8 billion, and real estate funds with inflows of €400 million. Money market products faced overall net outflows of €14.4 billion for September.
The single fund markets with the highest net inflows for September were:
United Kingdom €3.7 billion
Germany €1.7 billion
Switzerland €0.4 billion
While the higher outflows came from:
France -€19.8 billion
Luxembourg -€9.3 billion
Netherlands -€4.0 billion
BlackRock, with net sales of €6.1 billion, was the best selling group for September overall, ahead of Standard Life with €1.4 billion and Vanguard which sold €1.1 billion.
Jaguar Growth Partners, a private equity firm focused exclusively on real assets in growth markets globally, announced the opening of its office in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Jaguar Growth Investimentos do Brasil Ltda, will be headed by Christian Klotz and Ricardo Costa, two recent additions to the firm’s growing team. The new office establishes Jaguar’s presence in Latin America with investment and asset management activities in Brazil and throughout the region.
“We understand the importance of a local presence, strengthening our relationships with entrepreneurs, private equity firms and others in the region,” said Jaguar´s managing partner Thomas McDonald. “Our presence in Brazil is the first of several strategic office locations, highly-important and distinguishing for Jaguar Growth Partners,” added managing partner Gary Garrabrant.
Prior to joining Jaguar, Mr. Klotz co-founded UJAY Capital, an investment fund focused on Brazilian and Latin American listed equity and macro securities. At UJAY, he was the portfolio manager of the long-short equity fund with investments in various sectors including real estate, while based in Sao Paulo. Prior to UJAY Capital, Mr. Klotz was a portfolio analyst at Pollux Capital, a Brazilian based asset manager. He has served as a director for several publicly-listed real estate and industrial companies in Brazil including Abyara and Portobello. Mr. Klotz holds a B.S. in Industrial Engineering from Instituto Maua de Tecnologia in Brazil and received his MBA from the Columbia Business School, University of Columbia, and Walter Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley.
Prior to joining Jaguar, Mr. Costa was a Partner at Gavea Investimentos, one of the largest alternative investment managers in Brazil with over US$ 7 billion in assets under management, controlled by JP Morgan Asset Management. Mr. Costa joined the private equity division of Gavea in December 2010 as a principal, becoming a partner in January 2013. At Gavea, Mr. Costa led several investments in the retail, logistics, services and telecom sectors, and was a board member of Camisaria Colombo, Cell Site Solutions (CSS), Rumo Logistica and Simpress. In October 2013, Mr. Costa assumed the CFO role and interim management of CSS, a co-investment of Gavea and Goldman Sachs Merchant Banking capitalizing on the opportunity to explore the growing telecom towers market in Brazil. From 2005 to 2010, Mr. Costa worked as an associate at Votorantim Novos Negocios (VNN), the private equity and venture capital arm of Votorantim Group, one of the largest Latin American industrial conglomerates, where he was responsible for the investments in IT/BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) and services sectors. Mr. Costa graduated from Fundacao Getulio Vargas in Sao Paulo (FGV-EAESP), where he received a BA in Business Administration, and is currently pursuing an MBA.
Foto: Youtube. La SEC marca nuevos récords en el número de expedientes y en su importe
In the fiscal year that ended in September, the SEC filed 807 enforcement actions covering a wide range of misconduct, and obtained orders totaling approximately $4.2 billion in disgorgement and penalties. Of the 807 enforcement actions filed in fiscal year 2015, a record 507 were independent actions for violations of the federal securities laws and 300 were either actions against issuers who were delinquent in making required filings with the SEC or administrative proceedings seeking bars against individuals based on criminal convictions, civil injunctions, or other orders.
In fiscal year 2014, the SEC filed 755 enforcement actions and obtained orders totaling $4.16 billion in disgorgement and penalties.
The agency’s first-of-their-kind cases included the first action involving: a private equity adviser for misallocating broken deal expenses; an underwriter for pricing-related fraud in the primary market for municipal securities; a “Big Three” credit rating agency; violations arising from a dark pool´s disclosure of order types to its subscribers; an FCPA action against a financial institution; an admissions settlement with an auditing firm; and an SEC rule prohibiting the use of confidentiality agreements to impede whistleblower communiction with the SEC.
“Vigorous and comprehensive enforcement protects investors and reassures them that our financial markets operate with integrity and transparency, and the Commission continues that enforcement approach by bringing innovative cases holding executives and companies accountable for their wrongdoing sending clear warnings to would-be violators,” said SEC Chair Mary Jo White. “The Enforcement Division’s leveraging of data, quantitative analytics and the expertise of our other divisions contributed significantly to this year’s very strong results.”
“The Division’s hard work, tremendous energy, and efficiency uncovered significant misconduct during the past fiscal year, and helped bring a significant number of high-impact, first-of-their-kind actions,” said Andrew J. Ceresney, Director of the SEC’s Enforcement Division. “I continue to be proud of the Division’s record of accomplishments, and we have already continued to pave new ground in the new fiscal year.”
The following table breaks down the SEC’s enforcement results for FY 2013 through 2015:
Photo: Jonathan Sage is the lead portfolio manager on the funds. MFS Launches Two Equity Income Funds
MFS launches two equity income funds: MFS Meridian Funds U.S. Equity Income and MFS Meridian Funds Global Equity Income.
Both funds seek total return through a combination of current income and capital appreciation. They follow a disciplined, repeatable process that utilises the full capabilities of MFS’ integrated global research platform, which includes fundamental equity and quantitative analysis. This approach is called MFS Blended Research.
The funds are available to investors through the Luxembourg-domiciled MFS Meridian Funds range. Jonathan Sage is the lead portfolio manager on the funds and is a member of the team that has been implementing the Blended Research investment process since 2001.
Thomas Angermann. Courtesy photo. "We Definitely See More Opportunities in European Equities and Particularly in Small and Mid Caps than Three Months Ago"
Thomas Angermann is a member of the Specialist Equities Team at UBS Global AM, based in Zurich. Specifically he is responsible for the management of a number of Pan European small and midcap mandates. In this interview with Funds Society, he explains why the growth potential currently offered by Small Caps is higher than the one that can be found for Large Caps.
Do you think the current momentum is good for European Equities? Has the equity valuation improved after the market correction in August?
After the recent market correction the valuation for European equities looks interesting now. We definitely see more opportunities in European equities and particularly in Small and Mid caps than three months ago. We think the current correction is healthy as the market is pricing out the too high growth expectations.
Which will be the key factors for the revaluation? Which factor will have a greater importance: Profits, QE support or other macro factors?
Three main drivers should be mentioned. First, the potential earnings growth for the next year as well as the current expectations about this growth potential. Second factor, the Chinese economy, it seems we see first signs of stabilization, however we are still waiting for robust evidence on this. The adjustment from the pure investment driven economy of the past to a more balanced consumer driven economy of the future will take years. That will also create a lot of opportunities. The third factor is monetary policy by the central banks. We think they will stay accommodative but we do not count on any additional measures yet.
In general, what are the risks of short/medium tern correction in European stocks markets? In particular for Small Caps?
As before, three main risk drivers should be highlighted. The first risk we face are Emerging market turbulences. Specifically how the Emerging markets growth pattern will behave in the upcoming months and the level of volatility of EM currencies. We should keep an eye on how this will impact European export driven economies. The second driver is the behavior of the European consumer and to what extent it will remain supportive. A third risk factor would be given by central banks. However, as previously mentioned, we do not expect any upcoming change in their policies and it seems a first interest rate hike by the Fed is desired by the markets.
What extra value are Small Caps going to add vs. Large/Midcaps? Can Small Caps offer greater potential opportunities?
First of all the growth potential currently offered by Small Caps are higher than the one that can be found for Large Caps. Additionally Small Caps offer M&A opportunities, as in the current low growth environment larger companies might add growth by buying smaller companies. We expect that the M&A activity will increase, founding its main targets in the Small Caps universe rather than in the Large Cap world. A second factor is the daily volatility. Surprisingly during last months the volatility registered for Small Caps has often been lower than the one for Large Caps. However we will need further evidence of this pattern.
Is the SC sector affected anyway by general elections (such as the Spanish ones)?
Regarding elections, Small Caps sector is as much affected as the Large Caps sector is. We do not expect any remarkable long term impact coming from the Spanish political situation. However there might be short term effects.
Do you think that volatility will increase in the upcoming months? In this sense, which would be the consequences of a volatility increase regarding your investment style?
Since volatility has already been increased since end of last year with additional acceleration during August and September we do not expect further significant increases under current market conditions. However, in the case of a “Black-Swan-Event” (occurrence of something important which was not expected) we will see an further increase. Nevertheless we would not change our investment style and we would stick to our stock picking approach but would have an even closer look at our risk systems.
Foto: Thomas8047
. Los hedge funds van camino de registrar su peor ejercicio desde 2011, aunque superan al S&P 500
The Preqin All-Strategies Hedge Fund benchmark returned -1.44% in September, marking another difficult month for hedge funds as relative value funds were the only top-level strategy to see positive performance. This is the fourth consecutive month of negative returns for hedge funds, the longest negative period since Jun – Nov 2008. Overall returns for 2015 YTD now stand at only 0.18%, with the year on course to have the lowest returns since 2011. However, with the S&P 500 currently returning -3.14% for the year so far, hedge funds are still outperforming public markets.
