Fund Times: 19 – 23 May

Credit Suisse shut Target Return fund; HSBC rebrands asset management business; Baring launch Global Agriculture fund; Burdett & Potter to run Thames River Multi Select fund; and Credit Suisse lose head of global equities

Tom Whitelaw 23 May, 2008 | 2:44PM
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Credit Suisse Shut Target Return Fund
Credit Suisse has this week taken the decision to close its Target Return fund. The fund was launched in April 2004 with the aim of giving investors a positive return, year on year, whatever the market conditions. In order to do this it hoped to beat six month Libor by 2.5%. However, from the end of April 2004 has lost an annualised 1.6%, compared to a return north of five percent per annum for six-month Libor. Unsurprisingly, the fund only managed to attract £8 million, making it uneconomic to run. Investors in the fund have been offered the option to switch into other Credit Suisse

funds when it closes on 20 June.

HSBC Rebrands Asset Management Business
HSBC Group Investment Businesses will be rebranded HSBC Global Asset Management with effect from 2 June, 2008. As part of the rebrand, all entities operating as HSBC Investments will also adopt the HSBC Global Asset Management name. HSBC specialist asset managers Halbis, Sinopia, cash specialist Liquidity and fund of funds range Multimanager will keep their own trading titles but will all be clearly endorsed as HSBC Global Asset Management businesses.

Baring Launch Global Agriculture Fund
Baring Asset Management is the latest group to jump on the agriculture bandwagon with the launch of Baring Global Agriculture. The fund will be managed by Jonathan Blake, and aims to provide long-term capital growth from investment in companies where the majority of earnings are derived from activities relating to agriculture, or have the potential to benefit from that theme. Echoing recent headlines, Barings believe that rising food consumption coupled with biofuel production will drive attractive returns in the industry. The fund will be UK domiciled, and should launch in the third quarter of 2008. Investors already have a variety of low-cost ETFs to choose from if they wish to obtain agriculture exposure.

Credit Suisse Lose Head of Global Equities
Credit Suisse this week announced that its head of Global Equities, Kim Goodwin, has left the group after two years. Goodwin will be replaced by Head of European Equities Cesar Peraz. Peraz joined Credit Suisse last year from M&G and will now take charge of both UK and European Equity desks.

Burdett & Potter to Run Thames River Multi Select Fund.
Thames River’s new offshore multi-manager range will include the Multi-Select fund, to be run by former Credit Suisse stars Gary Potter and Robert Burdett. The fund-of-funds will consist of 15 to 25 funds, with up to 40% of these from Thames River or Nevsky Capital, its emerging markets subsidiary. The remaining 60% will come from third party providers that are highly rated by Potter and Burdett. The fund will be domiciled in Dublin, and be available for sale in the UK from 3 June.

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Tom Whitelaw  

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