With the industry’s continued trend of retailisation, State Street has become the third big custodian to link with OneVue for retail registry – due to important client PIMCO’s new digital platform and information portal.
As previously announced, PIMCO insourced its retail distribution from Equity Trustees and built up its internal team ahead of the launch of a new website and change of retail registry. The selection of OneVue by PIMCO and State Street, follows the earlier moves by BNP Paribas and Northern Trust to also use OneVue, which is now the largest provider of outsourced retail registry.
Paul Khoury, head of State Street Global Services for Australia and New Zealand, said his firm’s involvement in the digital platform arose out of its longstanding and significant custodian relationship with PIMCO.
“It underlines our commitment to being a compelling strategic partner for clients like PIMCO as they expand their Australian operations and their business needs continue to evolve,” he said. “In this case, PIMCO had a specific need for retail registry services and we are excited to be working with them and OneVue to create a tailored solution.”
The PIMCO platform and new website (www.pimco.com.au) will allow all institutional, advised retail and direct investors to have portal access to their underlying holdings and accounts.
Adrian Stewart, executive vice president and head of PIMCO Australia and New Zealand, described the platform’s capabilities as “a new standard” which he thought should become universal for the industry.
Another important aspect of the new website will be to allow better access to a greater level of educational and other content from the various PIMCO offices around the world, particularly head office in Newport Beach, California, which is renowned for its analyses on funds management issues.
Stewart said that State Street had always provided unit registry for PIMCO’s institutional clients, along with master custody, but with the internalization of its distribution from former provider Equity Trustees, for a new “engagement model” with clients, they had to decide what to do about retail registry. “OneVue came into the conversation,” he said.
Because OneVue works in all three market segments, it should enable the same level of service across PIMCO’s customer base and also allow better interaction with the ASX’s mFund market.
mFunds represent one of the new product ranges for distribution channels – alongside exchange traded products – currently being favoured by SMFS trustees.
PIMCO has six mFunds, which is a market also championed by OneVue as one of the founding partners of the service, which allows managed funds to be traded through the CHESS system at the end of each day.
Stewart said that PIMCO had expanded its marketing team in Australia to manage the increased volume of information which will be available through the portal. “We want to make sure we are speaking with the right tonality to the right audiences,” he said.
In a statement, PIMCO said: “This has been a multi-year global effort and underscores the firm’s commitment to the Australian and New Zealand institutional market and continued expansion of the firm’s wealth management distribution model in Australia.
“For instance… we have expanded our focus on the retail segment through building out our local team and expanding on the educational tools and resources that we offer to our clients to help maximise the value they deliver to their clients. This digital platform will continue to evolve over the next 12 months as we continue to build on the educational tools and resources that we offer to our clients.”
* Greg Bright is publisher of Investor Strategy News (Australia)
NOTE: the author is a small shareholder in OneVue.