Monday, August 30, 2010 2:11 PM EDT
Axis Investment Fund bites the dust
Axis Investment Fund Inc., a struggling labour-sponsored investment fund, is being put out of its misery.
Shareholders have approved the windup of the fund and sale of the assets to NorthStar Bancorp Ltd., a Toronto-based merchant banking firm. The net proceeds from the sale will be distributed to shareholders.
The fund, which was first set up in 2001 to focus on the technology sector, lost 84.4 per cent for the year ended July 31, and has posted an average annual loss of 50 per cent over the last five years.
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Thursday, August 12, 2010 8:36 AM EDT
Sprott hunts for hedge funds successor
Eric Sprott is on the hunt for someone to replace him on his hedge funds now that a successor has been named for his corporate role as chief executive officer at Sprott Inc. SII-T
The high-profile, bearish hedgie said Wednesday in a conference call that it is a more difficult to find a replacement compared with his mutual funds, but hopes to have someone in place in a few years.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010 7:09 PM EDT
Peter Grosskopf becomes CEO of Sprott Inc.
Eric Sprott’s corporate succession plan is in full swing.
Peter Grosskopf was appointed Tuesday as chief exective officer of Sprott Inc. SII-Tto succeed Mr. Sprott who founded the firm. Mr. Grosskopf, who was most recently president of Cormark Securities Inc., takes over his new duties in early September.
Monday, July 12, 2010 6:21 PM EDT
GMP analyst cuts price targets on fund companies
GMP Securities has chopped price targets on three fund companies after assets tumbled in the May and June stock market downturn.
“We are lowering earnings forecasts to account for assets ending the quarter below our estimate,” analyst Stephen Boland said Monday. “Our new estimates are based on a stable growing market and offer an average 40-per-cent return with a 4.8-per-cent dividend yield.”
Tuesday, July 13, 2010 6:46 AM EDT
Two firms take HST hit for fund investors
Two small mutual fund players are giving consumers a break on the new harmonized sales tax (HST).
Brandes Investment Partners & Co. has launched a new series for four large funds that is targeting investors residing in provinces like Alberta, which still only charge the 5 per cent federal GST. The HST, which combines the provincial and federal tax as of July 1, ranges from 12 per cent in British Columbia and 13 per cent in Ontario to as high as 15 per cent in Nova Scotia.
The four Brandes funds are Brandes Global Equity, Brandes International, Brandes Sionna Canadian Equity and Brandes Sionna Canadian Balanced.
Brandes, which has $3.2-billion in assets and is a unit of U.S.-based Brandes Investment Partners L.P., plans to absorb the higher costs from the HST in its remaining funds until at least the end of this year.
“We are trying to be as fair as we can without, obviously, killing ourselves financially,” Leah Brock, senior vice-president of marketing at Brandes, said Friday. “If people are paying the tax, they should be paying for the province that they live in.”
Friday, July 2, 2010 4:15 PM EDT
Mavrix Fund makeover in works
It doesn’t come as a complete surprise, but the Mavrix and Seamark mutual funds are poised to be re-branded under the Matrix name.
The makeover is coming now that Seamark Asset Management Ltd. and GrowthWorks Ltd., which bought Mavrix Fund Management Inc. in 2009, have merged. The combined entity listed earlier this year as Matrix Asset Management Inc. MTA-T.
Most Mavrix funds are simply being renamed with the same mandates, but some others will have different tweaks or manager and mandate changes. Mavrix Global, a global equity fund, is turning into Matrix International Equity Fund. Manager Pictet International Management Ltd. is being replaced by Seamark Asset Management. See regulatory filings.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010 1:16 PM EDT
Musical chairs at Mackenzie Financial
The musical chairs at Mackenzie Financial Corp. continues.
Norman Raschkowan, chief investment officer at Mackenzie since late 2007, is taking over the Maxxum family of mutual funds from veteran manager Bill Procter, who retires after 41 years in the industry.
“With $6-billion in assets under management, the Maxxum family of mutual funds plays a significant role in many investor portfolios," Mackenzie’s chief executive officer Charles Sims said Wednesday. “With Norman’s appointment, we have selected an individual with leadership ability and significant investment experience.”
Mr. Raschkowan will become the Maxxum team leader and portfolio manager, effective Friday. He will oversee the Mackenzie Maxxum Dividend, Mackenzie Maxxum Dividend Growth and Mackenzie Maxxum Monthly Income funds. He was formerly chief investment officer at Standard Life Investments Inc. before joining Mackenzie.
Bob Tattersall, who had been set to retire by the end of this year after removing himself from daily stock-picking in two of Mackenzie's Saxon funds, takes over as Mackenzie’s interim CIO.
As Mackenzie, a unit of Winnipeg-based IGM Financial Inc. IGM-T, continues to suffer from net redemptions [including over $182-million in May], the departures over the past six months are raising some eyebrows.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010 11:49 AM EDT
Claymore ETF shorts 10-year bond
Worried about rising interest rates?
The Claymore Inverse 10-Year Government Bond ETF CIB-T is one way to capitalize on this concern. This latest offering from Claymore Investments Inc. aims to replicate the opposite of the daily total return before fees of the 10-Year Government of Canada Bond.
This unleveraged ETF “is a tool for investors who are looking to hedge against potential effects of rising interest rates without necessarily having to sell their current bond investments,” says Claymore chief executive officer Som Seif.
Thursday, June 24, 2010 5:54 PM EDT
New Canadian hedge fund targets euro-zone crisis
It’s not surprising that hedge fund managers will try to make money from Europe’s financial crisis.
But a hedge fund whose investment strategy simply focuses on the woes in the euro-zone seems, well, rather narrow.
Still, Canadian investment firm Redwood Asset Management Inc. plans on July 12 to launch the Garrison Hill European Crisis Fund that aims to provide investors with the ability to “profit and hedge their portfolios from deteriorating political and economic conditions in the euro zone.”
Tuesday, July 20, 2010 6:24 AM EDT
Vanguard plans cheap S&P 500 ETF
U.S. index fund giant Vanguard Group Inc. plans to launch a new exchange-traded fund with a bargain-basement fee that will rival the SPDR S&P 500 and iShares S&P 500 ETFs listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
The new offering will be the ETF version of its flagship Vanguard 500 Index fund (which is not available to Canadian investors), and comes with a fee of 0.06 per cent compared with 0.09 per cent for its U.S. rivals.
In Canada, the iShares S&P 500 ETF XSP-T hedged to Canadian dollars charges 0.24 per cent.
Vanguard pioneered index investing for U.S. investors in 1976 with the launch of its Vanguard 500 index fund, which has about $91-billion (U.S.) in assets today. It launched its first ETF in 2001 – the Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, which has about $14-billion in assets.
Fund Watch Contributors
Shirley Won
Shirley Won covers the fund industry and investments. She joined the Globe and Mail in 1996, and has also worked at the Montreal Gazette and Canadian Press.
