From the press release desk this week…
People moves
Aberdeen Standard Investments has expanded its business in Japan with four senior appointments across different functions:
- Takashi Ikeya has joined the firm as institutional sales for Japan. He will be responsible for leading the institutional business development in Japan. Before ASI, Ikeya was from Manulife Asset Management, where he was a senior director for institutional sales with a focus on credit, real estate and private markets.
- Jiro Hamagucho has been named as head of Japanese institutional product strategy and solutions, in which he is responsible for formulating product strategy across multiple asset classes and tailoring investment solutions for Japanese institutions. Before joining the firm, he was with Australian firm AMP Capital focusing on product strategy and development.
- Sayaka Iwase has been appointed as private market sales specialist, responsible for growing and servicing the private markets client base in Japan, across various alternative products and solutions. He was most recently vice president for investment at Tokyo-based Alternative Investment Capital.
- Kyoko Shimada has joined as head of marketing, where she will be responsible for driving the fimr’s marketing strategy for Japan and Korea. She was previously Fidelity International’s head of marketing in Japan…
State Street has appointed Wang Qi as Asia-Pacific head of research for State Street Associates, which is the firm’s academic affiliate that develops risks, investor behaviour and economic indicators and invesable indices for institutional investors. In this newly created Singapore-based role, Wang will be responsible for developing and expanding State Street Associates’ regional research capabilities and investable indices. Wang will report to Dan Gerard, Singapore-based head of innovation and advisory solutions for Asia-Pacific at State Street Global Exchange, and to Will Kinlaw, Boston-based global head of State Street Associates. Before State Street, Wang was previously from Edhec Infra, where she was head of risk modelling…
MSCI has appointed Jack Lin, its Hong Kong-based managing director and head of Asia-Pacific client coverage, to its executive committee. Lin first joined MSCI in May this year, and was previously Amundi Asset Management’s South Asia CEO…
Aetos Japan, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Asia real estate investment firm Aetos Capital Real Estate, has appointed Charlie Haase as a managing director to support the firm’s strategic business development efforts in Japan. Before Aetos, Haase was general manager at Tokyu Land Corporation’s US planning group, where he assisted the company with their principal investment business…
Family offices
Around 71% of family offices in Asia-Pacific indicated that succession planning is a key priority, according to the latest global family office report by UBS Wealth Management and Campden Wealth Research. The family offices in the region either have a succession plan in place or are developing succession plans at the moment…
Business moves
Phillip Capital Management has launched an ETF in the Lion City that invests in Singapore stocks. The Phillip Sing Income ETF aims to replicate the performance of the Morningstar Singapore Dividend Yield Focus Tilt 30 Index and is suitable for investors who want capital growth and regular income in the form of dividends, as reported previously…
Capgemini has acquired 20% of Indosuez Wealth Management’s subsidiary, Azquore, which specialises in technology outsourcing services and banking transactions for the wealth management sector. Capgemini’s investment in Azqore will enable the firm to accelerate the functional and technological development of its proprietary platform, while expanding its offering for customers to new services such as training and specialised consulting. Capgemini will also contribute to the development of Azqore in Switzerland, the Eurozone and Asia…
Mercer and Morningstar has formed an alliance to provide investors and advisors with a single global digital platform for institutional investment manager data, performance analytics and qualitative research. The new alliance pairs Mercer’s broad global institutional manager data and research with Morningstar’s independent research and data spanning open-end mutual funds, exchange-traded funds, separately managed accounts and indices…
Regulation
Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission has added protective measures on the sale of complex products in an offline environment, according to its conclusions to a consultation it issued in March this year. The suitability of complex products will need to be ensured and clients will need to be provided with product information and warning statements, according to the SFC, adding that these are the same protective measures which will be introduced for the distribution of complex products on online platforms. “We have aligned the requirements for intermediaries to conduct suitability assessments of clients in the sale of complex products so that they are the same both online and offline,” Julia Leung, SFC’s deputy CEO and executive director of intermediaries, said in a statement.
