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Bad loans haunt Bank of Ireland
August 11, 2010--Pre-tax profits at Bank of Ireland fell 60 per cent in the first half of the year after it racked up almost €1bn (£832m) of losses relating to the tattered portfolio of commercial property loans that it is selling to the Irish government.
The bank is undergoing a restructuring after an overzealous lending spree left it nursing bad debts when the Irish property market collapsed. It is now repairing its balance sheet, largely by transferring about €12bn of property loans to the National Asset Management Agency, the Irish government-run bank, at a discount.
Bank of Ireland, which is 36 per cent state-owned, incurred a €466m loss on the sale of the first tranche of €2.2bn of loans, which were shifted to Nama this year.
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Source: FT.com
Germany sees launch of biggest fund of fund since Lehman collapse
August 11, 2010--LGT Capital Partners and Solutio have launched Germany's biggest private equity fund of fund since the collapse of Lehman Brothers.
The launch coincides with reports from Fidelity International that the German fund of fund market has recovered to pre-crisis levels.
Originally drafted for €500m, LGT’s investment fund has amassed €562m in assets according to Solutio. The funds come from over 30 investors, including pension schemes, insurance companies and foundations.
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Source: IP&E
Britain opposed to any EU-wide taxes
August 10, 2010-- Britain will block any attempts by the European Union to introduce new bloc-wide direct taxes to finance the EU budget, a minister said Tuesday.
The EU hopes the plan, expected to be unveiled next month, will give it more independence and help finance the 27-country bloc's expansion proposals.
James Sassoon, the Commercial Secretary, said Britain insists that it retain full control over its own tax policy.
"The government is opposed to direct taxes financing the EU budget," he said.
"The UK believes that taxation is a matter for member states to determine at a national level and would have a veto over any plans for such taxes."
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Source: EU Business
Press Release: ISE initiates “Sustainability Index” Project
Istanbul Stock Exchange (ISE) and Business Council for Sustainable Development Turkey signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) and initiated the “ISE Sustainability Index” Project in a joint press meeting
August 10, 2010--Mr. Hüseyin ERKAN, Istanbul Stock Exchange Chairman & CEO, and Mr. Mehmet
GÖÇMEN, Chairman of Business Council for Sustainable Development Turkey, today signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in order to jointly create a new index offering significant opportunities for the capital markets, companies and investors, namely, “ISE Sustainability Index”.
Mr. Hüseyin ERKAN remarked on the relevance of sustainability programs to the investment environment.“In preparing their management strategies, companies now take into consideration the social and environmental risks caused by their operations in
addition to the economic added value they create. Consumers on the other hand, in their purchases of goods and services, now consider the effects of such goods and services on
the society and on the environment. Shareholders expect companies to be transparent and
accountable on these subjects.
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Source: Istanbul Stock Exchange (ISE)
iShares considers expanding fixed income ETF range in Europe
August 10, 2010--BlackRock is considering how to expand its range of fixed income exchange traded funds after seeing assets held in iShares European-domiciled fixed income ETFs more than double over the past two years and surpass the $25bn mark.
“When iShares started to create fixed income ETFs in Europe in 2003, we really had no idea that the business would grow to this size,” said Alex Claringbull, senior portfolio manager at BlackRock:
“At that time, ETFs were generally viewed as equity related instruments and indeed many people thought that the “E” stood for equity.
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Source: FT.com
BT Asset Management Launches Licensing Procedure for a Passively Managed Fund on ATX
August 10, 2010-- BT Asset Management launches the licensing procedure of the BT Index Austria ATX, a passively managed fund on the ATX, the Austrian Traded Index. The ATX, the leading index of the Vienna Stock Exchange, is a capitalization-weighted price index, made up of 20 Austrian blue chip stocks traded at the Vienna Stock Exchange. The index is calculated and disseminated in real time and denominated in EUR.
As of 31 July 2010, the ATX market capitalization amounted to EUR 58,87bn, the effective tradable capitalization being EUR 35,20bn.
The ATX is a globally recognized brand name and reference for the Austrian capital market. Worldwide, the index is used by more than 23 issuers (banks, insurance companies, asset managers) as underlying for their financial instruments, such as structured products and standardized derivatives (futures and options). Currently, there are over 1.500 structured products (certificates, warrants, bonds), 2 Exchange Traded Funds and 2 passively managed funds linked to ATX.
“Banca Transilvania Asset Management is the first Eastern European financial institution that has received a license from Wiener Börse AG to use the ATX as underlying for a fund containing Austrian shares. We are happy to see an increasing interest of Romanian investors in companies listed on the Vienna Stock Exchange,“ said Michael Buhl, CEO of Wiener Börse AG.
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Source: Wiener Börse AG
France rejects EU-wide tax plan
August 10, 2010--France on Tuesday rejected as "ill-timed" EU authorities' proposal for new bloc-wide direct taxes to finance the EU budget, adding its voice to protests from London and Berlin
We judge this idea of a European tax perfectly ill-timed," France's junior minister for Europe, Pierre Lellouche told AFP.
"Any extra tax is currently unwelcome. It is much more the time for the member states and also European institutions to make savings."
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Source: EUbusiness
BlackRock to consider expanding fixed income ETF range
August 9, 2010--BlackRock is considering how to expand its range of fixed income exchange traded funds after seeing assets held in iShares European-domiciled fixed income ETFs more than doubling over the past two years and surpassing the $25bn mark.
“When iShares started to create fixed income ETFs in Europe in 2003, we really had no idea that the business would grow to this size,” said Alex Claringbull, senior portfolio manager at BlackRock: “At that time, ETFs were generally viewed as equity related instruments and indeed many people thought that the “E” stood for equity. However, the vast majority of assets in continental Europe are held in fixed income and we thought that investors would be attracted by the liquidity, diversification and transparency that could be offered via fixed income ETFs.”
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Source: FT.com
European ETF activity highlights for July 2010: NYSE Euronext
August 9, 2010--At the end of July, NYSE Euronext had 535 listings of 487 ETFs from 17 issuers. These ETFs cover more than 300 indices exposed to an extended range of assets and strategies (Equity, Fixed Income, Commodities, Short, Leverage, etc…).
The number of ETFs increased by 8.46% YTD compared to the end of 2009. So far this year, 46 new ETFs have been listed, while 8 ETFs have been the subject of mergers by absorption.
Both the daily average number of trades and daily average turnover figures again showed solid YOY growth in July 2010. On average, there were 8 011 trades on a daily basis, representing an increase of 18.2% versus July 2009. Daily average turnover increased from €305 million in July 2009 to €330.2 million in July 2010, or 8%.
At the end of July, the combined Assets Under Management of all ETFs listed on the NYSE Euronext European markets totaled €118.6 billion, an increase of 31.5% from the €90.2 billion at the end of July 2009.
The combination of the flow of 20 first-class Liquidity Providers, competitive market makers, client orders and our high capacity, low latency technology contributed to a median spread of 30.56 bps of all listed ETFs, down from 35.58 bps in July 2009.
At the end of July 2010, NYSE Euronext’s Liquidity Providers program featured 20 Liquidity Providers that had a total of 985 liquidity provision agreements, providing firm bid/ask quotes with minimum size and maximum spread requirements for the entire trading session on all ETFs.
Five new option contracts on ETFs are now available via NYSE Liffe. The respective underlying ETFs, and their trading symbols, are:
Lyxor ETF Stoxx Europe 600 Banks – BNK;
Lyxor ETF Stoxx Europe 600 Oil & Gas – OIL;
Lyxor ETF Stoxx Europe 600 Basic Resources – BRE;
Lyxor ETF Stoxx Europe 600 Telecommunications – TEL;
Lyxor ETF China Enterprise (HSCEI) – ASI.
For more info visit www.euronext.com/etf.
Source: NYSE Euronext
Thomson Reuters MiFID Monthly Market Share Reports For July 2010
August 6, 2010--The Thomson Reuters MiFID Monthly Market Share Reports For July 2010 are now available.
view full report
view Main Trading Venues for all European Equities report
Source: Thomson Reuters
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