Hedge fund fees
Around 25% of global hedge fund managers surveyed by EY have reduced or expect to reduce management fees. Investors continue to place management fees under scrutiny, forcing managers to lower operating expense ratios, according to the survey. The average operating expense ratio is at 1.75%, down from 1.95% in 2015…
People moves
Bank J Safra Sarasin has appointed Bellen Chang as managing director for client advisory for the Philippines in the firm’s ultra high net worth team. Based in Hong Kong, she reports to Vinay Gandhi, managing director and CEO of UHNW Asia. Before joining the bank, she was previously from UBS, where she was the firm’s executive director and a client advisor in the Philippines since 2006…
Fintech
The Monetary Authority of Singapore, in partnership with The Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) and in collaboration with SingEx Holdings, held the second Singapore fintech festival this week. Around 25,000 participants from 100 countries attended this year’s festival. A new feature this year is the investor summit or “deal day”, which provided an opportunity for Singapore-based fintech start-ups to access funding from local and global investors…
The MAS and the Philippines’ central bank, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, have signed a fintech cooperation agreement. With the agreement, the authorities will be able to refer promising fintech firms to each other, share emerging fintech trends and developments and facilitate work on fintech projects together…
Bitcoin
The MAS has released a detailed guide to digital token offerings. This follows the regulator’s announcement in August that if a digital token constitutes a product regulated under the MAS, the offer or issue of digital tokens must comply with the applicable securities laws. The paper provides general guidance on the application of laws in relation to offers or issues of digital tokens in Singapore…
Impact investing
Nearly all (97.2%) of Asia’s young HNWIs and UHNWIs indicated in a Lombard Odier survey that they were willing to increase their allocations to impact investing. However, 56% have not yet made any single impact investment and a further 26% were unfamiliar with the basics of impact investing…
Fund changes
Old Mutual Global Investors has insourced its US Dividend Fund. The fund, which was previously managed by Barrow, Hanley, Mewhinney & Strauss, is now managed by OMGI’s global equities team headed by Ian Heslop…
Stock Connect
Today marks the third anniversary of the Shanghai and Hong Kong Stock Connect programme. At the initial stage, the programme did not entirely live up to market expectations. However, despite earlier challenges, the programme has become a clear success, said Dmitriy Vlaslov, portfolio manager at East Capital. The average daily turnover for Northbound trades is around RMB 2.6bn ($390m), while the average turnover for Southbound trades is RMB 2.2bn…
