Investment News

The world’s major pension systems enjoyed their strongest year, last year, for growth compared to GDP, since 1998. The bad news, of course, is that the average 11.2 per cent rise for many countries this helped by stalling or falling GDP. The annual ‘Global Pension Assets Study, 2021’ from the Thinking Ahead Institute based in… [Read More…]

AMP NZ is betting its wealth management future on passive investments, technology and an acquisition strategy to boost the AdviceFirst group after a mooted takeover deal for its ASX-listed parent fell over last week. US investment business Ares Management binned its A$6.3 billion bid for AMP last week, sending the share price of the embattled… [Read More…]

Milford Asset Management deputy chief investment officer, David Lewis, will leave the business after eight years triggering a reshuffle and new hires at the roughly $10 billion trans-Tasman boutique. Lewis will transition his portfolio management duties for the Milford Diversified Income Fund to colleague, Paul Morris, in April before officially exiting the firm at the… [Read More…]

AMP Capital NZ is to wind up its approximately $90 million Commodities Fund after nine years in operation. Launched in 2012, the AMP Capital Commodities Fund has faced stiff market headwinds almost since launch for the alternative asset class with many investors ultimately folding after years of negative returns. While the AMP Capital commodities strategy… [Read More…]

Investors in most asset classes chalked up positive results during 2020 in a year that saw top-to-bottom returns span an on-trend 29 per cent divide, the latest annual Mercer ‘periodic table’ reveals. Released last week, the ever-fascinating Mercer analysis (available here in interactive format) shows 75 per cent of the 16 asset classes on display… [Read More…]

The Commonwealth of Australia Bank (CBA) NZ subsidiary, ASB, recorded a 4 per cent decline in funds management revenue for the last half of 2020 compared to the same period a year earlier, largely due to its exit from the investment administration business. According to the CBA half-year results released last week, ASB funds management… [Read More…]

Auckland-headquartered investment administration firm MMC has acquired the remaining half of Australian administrator IFAA Group from interests associated with its managing director and co-founder Neil Harvey. MMC bought its first slice of IFAA last March for an undisclosed sum. Harvey, who remains in the managing director role after the deal’s completion, said the firm would… [Read More…]

Almost all sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) accept climate change will impact investment portfolios but only a third have implemented formal strategies to address the challenge, a “first-of-its-kind” survey of the sector has found. According to the International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds (IFSWF) study, 93 per cent of the 34 institutions captured in the inaugural… [Read More…]

Investors should increase allocations to active management strategies against an increasingly uncertain global backdrop, according to a new Willis Towers Watson (WTW) report. The WTW analysis says “skilled active management offers growing value for money” as a number of factors converge to add risk to passive plays. “It is not easy finding skill and the… [Read More…]

The recent GameStop saga highlighted the growing influence of young, digitally empowered investors. But Abhy Singla, co-founder and chief technology officer of pioneering NZ fintech firm Invsta, explains why the Millennial generation is really looking for new ways to engage with their investments rather than disrupting markets…   Having grown up in a time of… [Read More…]