Pictet Launches Conservative HF-Like Mutual Fund |
Date: Saturday, November 17, 2007
Author: Martin de Sa'Pinto, HedgeWorld
GENEVA (HedgeWorld.com)—Pictet Funds, the fund
distribution arm of Swiss private banking firm Pictet & Cie, has
launched a risk-averse version of its PF (LUX) Absolute Return Global
Diversified Fund. The new fund, PF (LUX) Absolute Return Global
Conservative, will target gross-of-fee returns equal to or above the
Euro Overnight Index Average plus 2%, independent of overall market
conditions.
Like Global Diversified, Global Conservative will replicate
exposure to market betas, or risk premia, through exposure to a number
of securities, including derivatives, though the new fund will target a
lower level of volatility. Its exposures will be located in both
developed and emerging markets, in both equities and fixed income, for
all major currencies. Fixed-income securities will be selected across
all maturity and credit quality ranges.
The fund will also include exposure to Pictet's "best-in-class"
funds, which the firm refers to as "alphas" and which will be selected
on "quality of the investment process, confidence in the investment
team managing the fund, alpha generation potential and portability,"
according to a news release.
The new fund will be managed by Gianluca Oderda, Olivier
Doleires and Philippe Pol from the multi-asset and total return unit at
Pictet Asset Management. "By engineering a new combination of PAM's
solid expertise in producing superior alphas, with exposures to
carefully chosen market risk premia, we aim to reduce the market risk
compared to a traditional balanced portfolio while increasing the
overall return, thereby significantly improving the Sharpe ratio," said
Mr. Oderda in a press statement.
Exposures will be monitored daily using Pictet's proprietary
risk management platform. Tight risk management and margin constraints
should ensure that foreign exchange and other exposures are hedged
wherever possible.
While they may look like hedge funds, and target the same
client base, Global Diversified and Global Conservative are UCITS
III-compliant. It is a further indication of how firms are taking
advantage of more liberal UCITS III rules to broaden the potential
client base for funds which would previously have been restricted to
qualified investors.
The fund is open to institutional investors and distributors in the
United Kingdom, and to institutions, private banking and retail
investors in Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Liechtenstein,
Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Singapore, Sweden and the United
Kingdom. The minimum investment for the institutional share class is 1
million euro ($1.46 million) and has an annual management fee of 0.4%.
The private investor class, which charges an annual management fee of
0.8%, has no minimum investment.
Pictet & Cie is one of Switzerland's largest private banks,
with more than 2,700 staff in offices located around the world. Its
asset management arm has more than 430 billion Swiss francs ($383
billion) under management and custody.
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