Asset management

Why is Tiger dodging family office-dom?

19 Jul 2022

Chase Coleman’s main fund has lost about 50% in the year to May. Often this would prompt others, who struggle to recoup losses, to return cash. But Tiger’s fee structure enables it to keep going. That’s a more transparent way of doing things as long as managers stick around.

ESG is more of a muddle than a fiddle

19 Jul 2022

Environmental, social and governance investing is under the spotlight. In this episode of The Exchange podcast, Bridgewater’s sustainable finance gurus Karen Karniol-Tambour and Carsten Stendevad explain how ESG’s main problem is a lack of clarity over its goals.

Capital Calls: Citi’s luck, BlackRock’s blues

15 Jul 2022

Concise views on global finance: Citigroup’s second-quarter earnings were buoyed by its focus on trade flows and helping companies. Meanwhile, the world’s largest asset manager thinks investments will shift further into bonds but that business is less lucrative.

Vendor is main winner in Brookfield’s towers coup

14 Jul 2022

The Canadian group and DigitalBridge are buying Deutsche Telekom’s masts in a 17.5 bln euro deal. Their ability to pay in cash helped beat bidders like Cellnex. Infrastructure funds have over $300 bln to invest, giving sellers scope to demand a high price even in tricky markets.

Guest view: A platform for climate collaboration

14 Jul 2022

Finance ministers and central bankers face inflation and stagnating growth. The climate crisis could dwarf these hardships. If structured well, G20 Country Platforms can help to unlock private capital to meet the challenge, writes United Nations climate envoy Mark Carney.

SoftBank’s Fortress sale calls for an interloper

13 Jul 2022

The Japanese tech conglomerate may sell the asset manager to Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala wealth fund. The mooted price tag of over $1 bln looks embarrassingly cheap. SoftBank’s recent investing mishaps, like Klarna, should make boss Masayoshi Son open to a higher offer.

Capital Calls: Delta’s earnings are bad and worse

13 Jul 2022

Concise views on global finance: Shares in the company fell 7% after the company missed earnings expectations. That’s bad, but worse is that its main strength – pricing power – has limits.

Gross margins are market’s next valuation fetish

11 Jul 2022

Growth-obsessed investors have cooled on companies with soaring sales. As first-half results approach, they’re looking lower down the income statement to see what’s left after deducting the direct costs of revenue. If that number is high, even loss-making groups can find favour.

Capital Calls: Chinese fishermen, UK’s Jupiter

28 Jun 2022

Concise views on global finance: Joe Biden goes after the People’s Republic’s commercial fishing fleet; the fund manager’s new chief executive has an even tougher task than his predecessor.

Investors need to learn to ride inflation cycle

23 Jun 2022

Bonds and shares are tumbling as prices soar, just as in the 1970s. The experience of that decade suggests value stocks, commodities and safe-haven currencies offer the best protection, says Edward Chancellor. But wild swings in inflation can still catch markets off-guard.

Green investors need to get their hands dirty

22 Jun 2022

Most money managers fight climate change by shunning stocks of polluting companies. By contrast, so-called transition funds target dirtier assets to clean them up. Though the approach brings risks, it could also deploy trillions of dollars of green capital in a smarter way.

Capital Calls: Fertilizer woes plant seed of doubt

8 Jun 2022

Concise views on global finance: Scotts Miracle-Gro’s profit warning nods to wide effect of commodities price surge.

DWS CEO exit is helpful deterrent for greenwashing

1 Jun 2022

Asoka Woehrmann resigned from the $7 bln asset manager as regulators probe allegations it exaggerated its sustainable investing skills. Fund groups have benefitted from booming demand for ESG investments. The fallout at DWS gives other bosses an incentive to tone down the hype.

Credit Suisse capital hike would speed turnaround

31 May 2022

The bank is considering raising $1 bln of equity, Reuters reported. That would be painful at such a low valuation, and the company denied it. But bigger balance-sheet buffers could fund faster shrinkage of the accident-prone investment bank, reducing its share-price drag sooner.

Allianz’s U.S. wound is not entirely staunched

17 May 2022

Europe’s largest insurer has effectively been kicked out of the U.S. market after admitting fraud and being forced to pay $6 bln in fines and compensation. CEO Oliver Baete will hope these body blows enable closure. But the fiasco raises questions about the rest of the business.

BlackRock spikes guns of green activists

10 May 2022

Larry Fink’s group will back more oil and gas production. After COP26, institutional money looked set to phase out fossil fuels, but an energy crisis has intervened. Rivals may follow the $10 trln fund giant, propping up driller valuations and complicating the green transition.

The elusive value of past investment mistakes

5 May 2022

A new library in Edinburgh hopes to improve financial understanding by studying historical errors. The best investors understand the importance of learning from their painful howlers. Yet, says Edward Chancellor, ultra-low interest rates have induced a kind of collective amnesia.

Deutsche can leave Credit Suisse in the dust

27 Apr 2022

Europe’s erstwhile bank basket case is now valued by investors on the same multiple of book value as the Swiss wealth manager. Rate hikes and a debt-trading boom will play to its strengths. Meanwhile, Credit Suisse’s weak capital ratio and slow growth will keep its shares gloomy.

UK fund manager picks canny time to do right thing

26 Apr 2022

The $10 bln Schroders is ditching its non-voting shares. A 37% discount to the voting stock helps smooth a deal without its dominant family losing out too much either. It’s a timely corrective to UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s efforts to lure more dual-share structures to London.

Asia wealth slump renders bank hype a little rich

26 Apr 2022

UBS’s pre-tax profit from private banking in the region slumped 38% in the first quarter. Lockdown pains should ease eventually, but China’s “common prosperity” agenda may undermine the highly touted opportunity. Hiring blitzes by Citi, HSBC and others could be hard to justify.