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I have selected three fund managers from the Global Macro strategy to provide insight on their investment approach.
Rcube is a Paris based Global Macro emerging manager. Rcube is seeded by Albert Friedberg, a leading Global Macro manager based in Toronto, and the French seeding fund Emergence, with institutional investors. What is your background ? Our DNA is in research. All of the portfolio managers have a fund management and quantitative background. Before founding Rcube, we have worked together for many years, for example at ADI, the successful independent Alternative French fund management boutique. What are your convictions ? We have identified the relatively poor offering in Global Macro strategy under the UCITS format. We also believe that our level of transparency is a strong differentiator amongst Global Macro managers. All of our positions are disclosed to investors in real time and all trades are explained in research papers. We identify on average one trade per week and 50 investment themes per year. Our investment approach is a combination of quantitative signals initiated by our proprietary tool « Macroscope » and discretionary approach to filter trades created by fundamental catalysts Why UCITS ? We started with a Cayman fund and moved to UCITS to match our European institutional investors' demand for a regulated, transparent vehicle. We have registered the fund in Luxembourg to facilitate our pan European distribution approach. Our main challenge is to deliver targeted returns in order to grow the fund from 70mls euros to our first target at 150mls. We use our own network of investors' contacts. CONTACT : Kati Kukkasniemi
Swell AM is a Paris based fund manager specialized in Tactical Asset Allocation founded by Olivier Ramé and Jean Phillipe Collin who worked respectively 10 and 6 years at La Française des Placements. Swell is a spin-off from La Française AM who manages over 38 billion euros of assets and is one of the top asset manager in France. What is your background ? Our strong focus is on risk management. Our approach is to identify market opportunities from a Global Macro perspective and to then allocate to market opportunities according to a determined daily risk position. We trade only liquid instruments, listed futures and options in the 3 main asset classes: Equity, Fixed Income and Currency. What are your convictions ? We clearly see a lack of managers in Global Macro in UCITS. The Global Tactical Allocation is a great tool for investors to diversify their current exposure in Fixed Income. Our core values are transparency, flexibility and alignment with investors. Swell GTAA Fund (ex-LFP Allocation 3) has been managed from inception since June 2005 by the same team. We are consistent with our investment approach. We publish every week the details of our investments as well as our market views. Why UCITS ? We are comfortable with the VAR risk limits determined by the UCITS format. The UCITS are in line with our values of liquidity and transparency. We have decided for a French domiciled fund as our core investors are based in France and for cost efficient reasons. Contact :
Olivié Ramé
Tideway is a London based investment managers specialising in macro and fixed income investing. Its Global Navigator flagship fund is hosted on the Alceda platform. Success in long term investments,according to Tideway, is inpired by Howard Marks as : Know what you don't know, patient opportunism, cycles. Can you tell us more about your fund? The Tideway UCITS UK authorized Global Navigator is an Absolute Return Fixed Income fund. The strategy is "Macro Credit". The Macro backdrop determines duration and overall credit exposure and then a concentrated credit portfolio is created as an "engine of return". The sectors in the credit fund are Insurane Companies, Banks and Utilities in that order. We buy household name issuers and go down the capital structure or buy lower liquidity bonds in order to generate excess returns. We are buying "the worst house on the best street" and so capture qualitative benefits too including rational behaviour by the issuers in difficult times. We hedge credit spread risk and interest rate risk using liquid exchange traded futures in equity and interest rate markets, running some basis risk. Where do you see the main constraints in 2014? Are we back to risk on situation with the Emerging markets impacting all markets? I believe asset prices in general are supported by QE and that whilst the bond market is the most obvious loser as QE unwinds, all assets will be hurt. When 10 yr US Govt bonds yield 1.5 %, real estate at 4 % looks cheap. When 10 yr US Govt Bonds go to 3%, real estate has to be at 5 or 6% not 4% and so this means prices have to ultimately fall. This applies to credit markets, equities, and housing. EM is just one immediate manifestation of this - too much liquity drove up prices to perfection and the exit door is not wide enough for everyone. Is liquidity an issue when you manage a fund a certain size with a certain investment horizon? Yes. At Tideway to date the assets have been very stable, with no single investor being dominant. We have therefore been able to manage the fund without fear of a large destabilising redemption. As we attract larger investors this may change a bit although leverage is possibly the most destabilising feature of all and we don't use that. Contact : Peter Doherty |
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This article was published in Opalesque UCITS intelligence.
 
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