February 2010
By European Pensions
Fidelity International has launched its Employer Financed Retirement Benefit Scheme (EFRBS), which offers additional solutions to employers who employ high earners that have been affected by the tax changes announced in 2009's Budget. From 6 April 2011, employees with incomes over £150,000, including pension contributions, will see the higher rate tax relief on money saved into their pensions reduced.
Following a busy 2009, Amundi ETF has listed 17 exchange traded funds (ETFs) on Deutsche Börse, marking a new stage in its international development strategy. The first wave of listings consists largely of equity ETFs and a money market ETF, five of which are unprecedented in Germany. LIMRA is a worldwide research, consulting and professional development organisation.
Legal & General (L&G) has launched its UK Absolute Fund and the European Absolute Fund, managed by Robert Churchlow and Gavin Launder respectively. Both funds are in the IMA Absolute Return sector and aim to achieve a positive absolute return in all market conditions on an annual basis.
Nikko Asset Management has is to launch its Nikko AM World Bank Green Fund for European and Middle Eastern investors. The fund, which is the first of its kind, can invest up to 100 per cent of its portfolio in green bonds issued by the World Bank (International Bank for Reconstruction and Development), and all proceeds will support World Bank funded projects that aim to tackle the causes and consequences of climate change in the developing world.
Butterfield Fulcrum has launched an independent Managed Accounts Platform to provide segregated and comingled managed accounts with a common set of tools for operations, administration and risk monitoring. Altinus provides an advanced operational and technological infrastructure that complements the investment management services provided by an asset allocator.
AllianceBernstein has launched its Global Thematic Research Portfolio, a Luxembourg UCITS III fund that pursues long-term capital growth by investing in a global universe of companies in multiple industries and sectors that could benefit from innovation. The Portfolio, which takes an unconstrained investment approach regardless of index or geography, aims to identify the most dynamic global economic and technological trends and invest in those early growth companies that are set to benefit from them.
Legal & General Investment Management (LGIM) has launched the Limited Price Inflation (LPI) Income Property Fund in partnership with Legal & General Property (LGP). The fund offers defined benefit pension schemes a way of investing in property coupled with a secure source of income, primarily government-backed, all with inflation-linkage. The fund aims to deliver an inflation-hedge (real) yield in excess of four per cent per annum.
Osmosis Investment Management is to launch the Osmosis Climate Solutions ETF on the London Stock Exchange from 8 February 2010. The exchange traded fund (ETF) will track the Osmosis Climate Solutions Index, a passive basket of global companies whose primary business is to create technologies, products and solutions that help to move towards a more sustainable, low carbon economy.
DST Global Solutions has launched its Retirement Options™ solution, designed to help advisers and clients identify suitable products in the retirement market. The product featrures a facility to compare product features, comprehensive calculations on multiple economic bases, and support for a wide range of post-retirement products, such as income drawdown, guaranteed annuities, variable annuities and investment linked annuities.
AEGON Asset Management is to launch its global opportunities fund, targeting investors looking for global macro exposure. The fund aims to provide institutional and professional retail investors with competitive absolute returns from a diversified global portfolio. It is a Dublin-registered UCITS III fund, available to investors in Ireland, the Netherlands, the UK and across Europe going forward.
Cisco has launched its online benefits portal, i-Benefit@Cisco, in the UK and Ireland. The online benefits package has been launched for Cisco's UK and Irish employees in conjunction with Thomsons Online Benefits. The scheme is designed to allow employees to interact and enrol in all their benefits.
Fund management firm Clavis Walden is to launch the first UK open-ended authorised property fund that pays gross dividends from property rental income, without the deduction of Corporation Tax. The Piccadilly UK Commercial Property Income Fund is the industry's first Property Authorised Investment Fund (PAIF), and targets a net distribution of seven per cent per annum and an optimum fund size of £400million. The Fund will invest directly in UK commercial properties.
Net Innovate has launched an online pensions tracking service. Pension Tracker allows subscribers to check the performance of their UK unit-based pensions, and offers a report on fund investment, performance compared with other pensions and retirement value illustrations that indicate if their portfolio is meeting their planned needs. The service is available at www.pensiontracker.co.uk
Sustainability research and ESG index construction company, ECPI, has launched the Global Carbon Equity Index. The new Index, which was developed in partnership with global management consultancy, Arthur D. Little, will form part of ECPI's thematic index family and allow equity exposure to mid-large cap companies. Paolo Sardi, CEO of ECPI Luxembourg, said: "The ECPI Global Carbon Equity Index has proven to outperform the market in both bull and bear markets, even through one of the worst recessions in history."
RWC Partners is to launch the RWC Advance Absolute Alpha Fund on 16 February 2010, a UCITS III global long/short equity absolute return fund. The fund, to be managed by Priya Kodeeswaran, will focus on companies and industries that are undergoing rapid change or stand to benefit or lose from innovation.
