From the press release desk this week…
People moves
Schroders has appointed Edward Young as a Hong Kong-based fund manager for its Asian fixed income team. In this newly created role, Young will focus on Asian and emerging markets credit markets and will report to Angus Hui, head of Asian and emerging market credit. Before Schroders, Young was a portfolio manager at HSBC Global Asset Management’s discretionary portfolio management team, where he was responsible for emerging market debt and US credit…
Franklin Templeton has appointed Sonal Desai as chief investment officer for fixed income, effective 31 December. In his role, Desai will oversee the firm’s corporate credit, emerging markets debt, bank loan, global aggregate, securitized, money market, multi-sector, municipal and fixed income strategies and teams, which manage $157bn in fixed income assets. Desai will be replacing Chris Molumphy, who has decided to retire from the firm at the end of the year. Before her new role, Desai was a director of research for Templeton global macro. Replacing her is Calvin Ho, whil will also be assuming portfolio management responsibilities for a number of Tempeton global macro strategies…
BNY Mellon Investment Management has appointed Shamik Dhar as chief economist. In this newly created role, Dhar will be responsible for conducting proprietary research and analysis to develop economic commentaries. He will act as the primary spokesperson for the firm on matters relating to global macroeconomics, geopolitics and capital market. Before BNY Mellon IM, Dhar was from the UK government’s foreign and commonwealth office, where he was chief economist since 2014…
The Hong Kong Investment Funds Association has appointed executive committee members for 2018-2019. They are:
- Clarchie Szeto, Aberdeen Standard Investments
- Nelson Chow, Alliance Bernstein Hong Kong
- Daniel Lehmann, Allianz Global Investors Asia Pacific
- William Law, Amundi Hong Kong
- Gerry Ng, Baring Asset Management
- Michelle Chua, BEA Union Investment Management
- Graham Turl, Blackrock
- Shen Hua, BOCHK Asset Management
- KP Luk, FIL Investment Management
- Isabella Chan, Franklin Templeton Investments
- Pedro Bastos, HSBC Global Asset Management
- Clarence Lee, Invesco
- Elisa Ng, JP Morgan Asset Management
- Bruno Lee, Manulife Asset Management
- Douglas Fick, Principal Asset Management
- Steve Bryant, Schroder Investment Management
- Eric Poon, Value Partners
Hong Kong’s wealth
Assets in Hong Kong’s private wealth management industry are expected to double in the next five years, according to a survey conducted by the Private Wealth Management Association and KPMG. The report also reveals that almost 80% of respondents believe that China will be the main driver of growth in the private wealth management industry, and that up to 49% of Hong Kong’s AUM could come from the mainland by 2023…
ESG
East Capital’s China Environmental Fund has been accepted on the Luxembourg Green Exchange (LGX). LGX, which was launched in 2016, is a platform dedicated to sustainable financial instruments, including ESG, green and social funds. East Capital’s China environmental fund invests in onshore and offshore China equities and includes sectors such as renewable energy, clean technologies and energy efficiency, waste management and recycling and new energy vehicles…
Willis Towers Watson and MSCI have co-developed an ESG-focused strategy. The Adaptive Capped ESG Universal Index is made up of companies in both developed and emerging markets. The constituents of the index are companies with strong and improving ESG attributes and exclude a small number of companies that fail to meet minimum ESG standards. A number of defined benefit and defined contribution clients in the UK have committed $655m for investment in the strategy as part of their core public equity allocations…
Regulation
The Monetary Authority of Singapore has finalized the features of the new corporate structure for investment funds, the Variable Capital Company (VCC), and has submitted the VCC bill to parliament this week. The new structure is expected to help position Singapore as a key fund domiciliation hub…
