Funds Hub

Good news for fundies, bad news for nephews

The National Association of Pension Funds isn’t quite as rambunctious as in the days of fat-cat bashing by Christine Farnish, but it still offers up intriguing glimpses into the lives and loves of the nation’s worker drones and retirees.

The latest survey (of 1,248 British full and part-time employees – for the record) makes very clear the priorities as people prepare for retirement, with full pockets winning a convincing victory over full hearts.

Some 71 percent pick out financial security as a bedrock of happiness in the dusk of life,  and they want to be fit enough to splurge it all on escorted Rhineland river cruises and hydraulic beds;  good health scores 69 percent.

It’s maybe a bit depressing, though, that just 45 percent think happiness will come from the love and attention of their family and friends. (More people say they’d get a kick out of travel in retirement — presumably escaping the unwanted embraces of significant others. One in seven respondents said the one thing they would miss most in retirement was time away from their partner…)

It’s a good bit of news for the fund firms flogging investments, and trying to tap into that fear of a penniless retirement. Respondents remain unconvinced their current pensions will deliver them the security they’re after (just 34 percent say they’re confident) and that means they’ll be trawling the market for products which can help make up the perceived shortfall.

Retail money has started to come back into the market, Schroders being one recent beneficiary, and new funds are seeking to sell the benefits of diversification to private investors stung by losses in narrow portfolios during the financial crisis.

One example has been Fidelity’s China Trust, the prospectus for which landed on my desk this morning (it was published online last week). What’s most attention-grabbing isn’t the 15 percent performance fee, but the marketing rouse of a draw for free holiday for two to Hong Kong for those investing via ISA. I guess if you win, you could always take along your husband or wife, son or daughter, and perhaps take the opportunity to explain your retirement priorities in the baldest possible terms.

from Summit Notebook:

Everyone needs a private banker

from Summit Notebook:

Tax evaders on the run

  By Neil Chatterjee     The U.S. has promised it will hunt down tax evaders.     And it seems tax evaders are on the run.     DBS bank, based in the growing offshore financial centre of Singapore, told Reuters it had been approached by U.S. citizens asking for its private banking services. But when told they would have to sign U.S. tax declaration forms, the potential clients disappeared.       Swiss banks also approached DBS on the hope they could offload troublesome U.S. clients to a location that so far has not been reached by the strong arms of Washington or Brussels.     DBS said no thanks. In fact many private banks and boutique advisors now seem to be avoiding U.S. clients.     Will this spread to other nationalities, as governments invest in tax spies and tax havens invest in white paint?     Is this the end of offshore private private banking?

from Summit Notebook:

Private Bank finds synergy in public bar

It is a little known fact that private bank Wegelin, Switzerland’s oldest bank is also active in the bars and restaurants business.

In its ‘Nonolet’ bars – a play on the Latin saying pecunia non olet (money doesn’t stink) - in St. Gallen and in Geneva, hedge fund managers and other financial professionals rub shoulders with other locals in the early evening over sparkling wine or champagne and snacks.

It may sound an odd sort of diversification, but Wegelin says there were forced to try a new line of business to ensure an upmarket crowd mingled on the ground floor of the Wegelin building.

“You cannot have a strange business there like a kebab shop,” said Wegelin partner Christian Raubach.

Wegelin was forced to launch a hostile takeover on a local bar which had attracted a lot of unruly drinkers near its St. Gallen branch office.

“We bought the bar, we fired the owners, and we put a nice Café in so we get a different crowd. The crowd that sits during the day drinking coffee and not vomiting drinking beer at night,” Raubach said.

The operation proved to be a success but is unlikely to develop in to a brand new business area.

from Summit Notebook:

Swiss brand key to banks’ cache

from Summit Notebook:

Geneva is for wealth management

Even for an American who's not wealthy, Geneva has a reputation as a global centre for wealth management - the place the world's rich come to stash their money and (they hope) make it grow.

    But you don't necessarily expect it to be so aggressive -- after all, the rich tend to be demure when it comes to their banking.

    Imagine one reporter's surprise, then, on arriving in the airport in Geneva and seeing bank ads everywhere. Think of the casino adds in Las Vegas's McCarron Airport or the technology ads in San Jose's Mineta Airport: it's the exactly the same in Geneva, only with wealth managers.

    Look left - there's UBS. Look right - there's Julius Baer. Look up in the baggage queue - there's a Swiss bank that emphasises a focus on the Arab world. A complete unscientific guesstimate suggests the display ads in the terminal run about 75 percent wealth management and 25 percent fine watches. (No surprise that every other storefront in the Ville Centre area of Geneva has watches on offer.)

    There is one plus to all of the bank ads in the airport for the less wealthy though. Tell your cab driver to head toward their addresses and you're likely to find the city's best cafes.