Vanguard Investments Europe has added a small cap equity index fund, the Vanguard Global Small-Cap Index Fund, to its suite of extremely reasonably priced index funds, bringing the total number up to 31. The fund will track the MSCI World Small Cap Index, which contains developed market small cap companies with market capitalizations of between € 190 million and € 2.1 billion. The fund will be run by Michael Buek, who has been at Vanguard since 1987 and currently manages €85 billion across 10 funds. In keeping with Vanguard’s history of providing low cost index funds, the expense ratio on this offering will be 0.60% for investor share classes (which are available in USD, Euro and Swiss
Francs). Institutional share classes will see an even lower TER of 0.50%, and unhedged Sterling share classes will have a TER of 0.40%. To read more about Vanguard’s low cost index trackers, click here
Mark Harris to head the multi-manager team at Henderson
Mark Harris, who arrived at Henderson with the New Star acquisition, will be the head of the Henderson-New Star multi-manager team from the start of 2010, taking over from Bill McQuaker. Harris has 20 years’ investment experience, and has worked at Aetna Unit Trust Management and at Edinburgh Fund Managers, where he was head of investment management. Harris will lead the eight member team, which manages £ 1.13 billion across thirteen funds including New Star American Portfolio, Henderson Multi-Manager Growth and New Star Balanced Portfolio. McQuaker, who has been at Henderson since 2005, will remain head of equities at the merged firm. He will also retain responsibility of the multi-manager funds he currently runs – the Henderson MM Income and Growth fund, Henderson MM Growth fund and Henderson MM Distribution fund. Another addition to the funds-of-funds team is Paul Craig, who also joined the firm with the New Star acquisition. Craig, who has 21 years’ industry experience, is the lead manager of the Cirilium range of funds under the Henderson-New star multi-manager umbrella, as well as manager of Henderson’s Investment Trust funds-of-funds.
HSBC expands ETF range
HSBC has announced plans to launch 30 new ETFs in 2010, which will be available in several European countries. Several of these ETFs will track emerging markets indices. The group will also expand its range of ETFs available for sale in Asia. In addition to the planned launches, the firm also cross listed its new HSBC FTSE 100 and HSBC EuroStoxx 50 ETFs on the NysE Euronext exchange in Paris. Another recent addition to their European ETF range is the HSBC CAC 40 ETF which was launched on the 7th of December. The moves come on the heels of the firm’s dramatic cuts to its fees on traditional tracker funds.
Pictet adds to emerging markets equity team
Pictet Asset Management has announced the appointment of a new head of EMEA and Latin America, Klaus Bockstaller. Bockstaller was previously at Fleming Family and Partners Capital Management LLP (he was a founding partner). At FCM, he managed two long/short equity funds – the FCM European Frontier fund and the FCM Global Opportunities Fund. He also spent six years as a portfolio manager at UBS Brinson and was head of EMEA at Baring Asset Management. At Pictet, Bockstaller will also be co-lead on the Global Emerging Markets Equities portfolios, together with Nidhi Mahurkar, Pictet’s head of Asia. A second addition to the emerging markets equity team is Hugo Bain, who will be a senior investment manager focused on Eastern Europe. Bain also previously worked at FCM with Bockstaller, where he was a founding partner and co-manager of the FCM European Frontier fund. He has worked in the industry since 1997, in various emerging markets related roles at first ING and then at Merrill Lynch.
Cazenove Capital Management acquires Thornhill
Cazenove has announced the acquisition of Thornhill Holdings Ltd a private wealth management firm based in London and Edinburgh. Cazenove gains access to Thornhill’s large Scottish client base, which they acquired through Martin Currie in 2003, through this acquisition and will add an estimated £600 million of assets, resulting in total assets under management of £14 billion.
Legal & General Investment Management hires new head of investment risk
LGIM has hired Paul Murray, formerly head of risk management – alternative investments at F&C, as their new head of investment risk. Murray has 10 years of risk management experience, and has worked at Synapse Investment Management, Rothschild Australia and ANZ Bank, as well as at F&C. He will be responsible for monitoring risk at LGIM’s active funds.
Martin Currie adds new hedged share classes to Japan funds
Martin Currie will be adding yen-hedged share classes to the Japan Core and Japan Alpha funds, which will allow investors to mitigate currency risk on their holdings. Investors in the funds will also be allowed to express their own currency views as Martin Currie will not penalize them for switching between shareclasses.
Morningstar qualitative ratings and reports issued this week
Morningstar issued new qualitative ratings and reports on a number of funds available to UK investors this week, including F&C Stewardship International and BGF Pacific Equity. Click here to see the full list.
