|
Welcome to the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute™
CURRENT NEWS
2/7/2010
The Wall Street Journal reports, "China's sovereign wealth fund, China Investment Corp., held U.S. stocks valued at US$9.63 billion as of Dec. 31, according to a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The filing, dated Friday, is a quarterly report of equity holdings filed by institutional investment managers with at least US$100 million in equity assets under management."
read more: Wall Street Journal
2/4/2010
SWF Investment Transactions by Target Countries
Source: SWFTD v1.6
The Sovereign Wealth Fund Transaction Database (SWFTD) is a dedicated database product that tracks sovereign wealth fund transactions from 1986 till present. With over 1,000 recorded transactions in real estate, listed equities, unlisted equities, and other unique acquisitions, we aim to be the most comprehensive source of SWF transactions. See more by ordering our database
PURCHASE NOW | View Sample Entries
read more: Sovereign Wealth Fund Transaction Database (SWFTD)
2/4/2010
The National reports, "Air Berlin and Etihad Airways have signed up for US$130 million (Dh477.4m) worth of financing provided by a new company controlled by Mubadala Development, the Abu Dhabi Government investment arm.
The new entity, called Sanad Aero Solutions, will provide financing and logistical support with a focus on aircraft engines and components.
Sanad – Arabic for “support” – adds another layer to Mubadala’s aerospace strategy, which includes plans to manufacture composite aircraft parts for Boeing and Airbus in Al Ain, and to build an aircraft in Abu Dhabi by 2018.
The company will provide financial support to airlines outsourcing their maintenance and repair work to two Mubadala affiliates, SR Technics in Switzerland and Abu Dhabi Aircraft Technologies (ADAT). Sanad’s first contracts involve a 10-year, $100m deal with Air Berlin for 12 spare engines and a 10-year, $30m contract with Etihad for components."
read more: The National
2/4/2010
China Daily reports, "Sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corporation (CIC) has finalized a $956 million investment deal with British private equity fund group Apax Partners, a source close to the fund said yesterday. The source confirmed media reports that CIC was planning to invest $956 million in Apax Partner's 11.2 billion-euro fund. Apax has already got approval from the British Financial Services Authority for the deal, which may also see CIC acquiring a 2.3 percent stake in the UK company.
The sovereign wealth fund is also in talks with Italian power operator Enel SpA on buying stakes in the energy firm and its subsidiary company Enel Green Power, the source said.
CIC's moves may tempt other foreign private equity groups to solicit financial support from the Chinese sovereign wealth fund. It also shows that China is still eager to invest its burgeoning foreign reserves in foreign markets after the heavily criticized loss-making investment in Blackstone two years ago.
Li Xiaogang, director of the Foreign Investment Research Center at Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, said although the global investment climate has shown strong signs of recovery, Chinese fund companies, especially the sovereign wealth fund, should remain cautious when engaging in overseas investment.
'The risk is that Chinese fund companies are usually constrained from influencing the investment strategy of overseas fund companies,' Li said. 'They are still novices in the global financial market, and hence should be well prepared before making any investments in foreign PE funds or companies.'"
read more: China Daily
2/2/2010
Duties would include
- Writing a minimum of 2 to 3 articles on sovereign wealth fund events per week.
- Help research M&A, fixed income, and equity transactions from SWFs.
- Work on special projects
Qualifications
- Minimum BA/BS in business/econ/english required from a top-tier university
- Minimum 1-2 years professional financial services experience
- Strong English writing skills
- CFA or other advanced financial credential strongly preferred.
More info on Graduate Research Intern |
View the Job Board
2/1/2010
Bloomberg reports, "Kuwait Investment Authority, the emirate’s sovereign wealth fund, made about a 40 percent return on its $750 million investment in BlackRock Inc.’s capital increase in May, the fund’s chief Bader al-Saad told the Al- Arabiya TV channel in an interview in Davos.
The sovereign wealth fund also was among a group of investors that had bid for Cadbury Plc, he said. Cadbury later agreed to an offer from Kraft Foods Inc.
Sovereign wealth funds, fueled in part by oil revenue, have been sources of capital around the world for companies including Citigroup Inc. and Morgan Stanley, helping them to withstand the credit-market seizure that followed the collapse of U.S. subprime mortgages. The KIA in December said it sold its stake in Citigroup for $4.1 billion and made a profit of $1.1 billion. The Kuwaiti fund’s $2 billion investment in Bank of America Corp., which lost 35 percent of its value, isn’t a source of concern, al-Saad said. The fund’s chief said he expects any sale of the stake in the U.S. bank to yield a profit. "
read more: Bloomberg
1/29/2010
Below is a presentation on Active Management by Yngve Slyngstad CEO, NBIM
The Three Most Important Active Decisions:
- The timing of benchmark changes
- Inflows and timing of moving from cash to financial assets
- Rebalancing decision when moving back to strategic assets weights
Key Summary Points:
- Twelve years experience of managing the fund suggests that active management could make an important contribution to the return of the fund in the long term.
- We believe we can improve the risk-return characteristics of the fund through active management.
- Norges Bank can not recommend a passive investment strategy which does not seek to achieve cost-efficient market exposure, insight in the underlying assets in which we are invested, or an understanding of the overall risk of our investments.
read more: NBIM Presentation
1/29/2010
Reuters reports, " Bahrain's sovereign wealth fund, which invests mostly at home, plans to diversify away from private equity projects and into stocks and bonds, its CEO said on Thursday. Talal Al Zain also told Reuters that Mumtalakat expects to receive a credit rating this year, which would allow it to tap capital markets for funding, including Islamic bonds. Mumtalakat, which has assets of around $10 billion, has investments in 35 companies. It holds stakes above 50 percent in more than 15 of those firms.
"We want to diversify. We will be looking at investments across markets. Our immediate focus will be to diversify investments, channel funds more towards liquidity, that is fixed income, equity markets," Zain said in an interview.
A $1 billion motor sports-themed commercial real estate project in Bahrain was likely to be financed by a combination of investment from strategic investors, private sector funding and some of its own equity, he said. But Mumtalakat would wait to receive its credit rating later this year before issuing bonds."
read more: Reuters
1/29/2010
According to Maktoob, "The Qatar Investment Authority, or QIA, has acquired shares in Al Rayan Bank last year for 191 million Qatari riyals ($52.5 million), Doha-based Al Arab daily reports Thursday citing the bank's financial statements. This is part of Qatar's sovereign wealth fund's plan to acquire 10% of the country's largest shariah-compliant bank, the paper reports, adding that it couldn't know whether the shares bought in 2009 cover the full 10%-stake QIA pledged to acquire. The acquisition was carried out through the local bourse, the daily reports citing the bank also known as Masraf Al Rayan."
read more: Maktoob
1/25/2010
According to Bloomberg, "China Investment Corp., the nation’s sovereign wealth fund, has had “early” talks for direct investments in Brazil and Mexico, Chairman Lou Jiwei said.
The sovereign wealth fund plans to increase direct investments this year and prioritizes such investments in developing markets, Lou said at a financial forum in Hong Kong today. CIC plans to be an “active, minority” shareholder in companies, instead of being involved in day-to-day operations, he said.
“In developing countries, the public capital markets are not as deep as developed countries,” Lou said. “We’re more interested in direct investments in developing countries.”
CIC, which held almost $300 billion in assets at the end of 2008, last year accelerated investments in resource-related companies, from U.S. power producer AES Corp. to Russia’s Nobel Oil Group, to hedge against rising inflation. Brazil is the second-biggest exporter of iron ore, while China is the largest buyer of the raw material."
read more: Bloomberg
1/22/2010
According to Bloomberg, "Petroleo Brasileiro SA is weighing a proposal by Qatar to take a stake in Brazil’s state-controlled oil producer as it seeks cash to develop offshore fields including the Americas’ largest discovery in three decades.
'Petrobras is a big company and it has a lot of activities, so why not?' Qatari Energy Minister Abdullah bin Hamad al-Attiyah said today in an interview in the Qatari capital, Doha. “Now they will discuss it and evaluate it.'
Qatar, holder of the world’s third-largest natural gas reserves, is deploying cash amassed from higher fuel sales to invest in companies across the globe, including a 17 percent stake in Volkswagen AG’s common shares last year. Petrobras is spending $174.4 billion through 2013 to boost output by more than half and develop offshore fields such as Tupi, the largest discovery in the Western Hemisphere since Mexico’s Cantarell."
read more: Bloomberg
1/22/2010
According to Reuters, "China will look for new ways to invest the world's largest foreign exchange reserves this year to generate higher returns, a senior regulatory official said on Thursday.
It would be a challenge for the country not just to preserve but to increase the value of the $2.4 trillion stockpile, said Guan Tao, head of the international balance of payment department at the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE).
In 2008, Beijing transferred $200 billion from the foreign exchange reserves to sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corp as part of efforts to seek higher returns.
"Making more efficient and diversified use of foreign exchange reserves is an important issue for China. We will explore this issue further this year," Guan said.
The currency composition of China's reserves is a closely held secret, but many economists assume the majority of it is held in U.S. dollar-denominated securities, likely Treasury debt.
China had been a net seller of $12 billion in Treasuries in the last six months, Alan Ruskin, Royal Bank of Scotland economist, said in a note, citing U.S. government figures. Guan also said that China would continue to face capital inflow pressure in the foreseeable future. However, SAFE said on Tuesday that a $453 billion increase last year in China's foreign exchange reserves partly reflected the effect of currency valuation and was not solely due to inflows of speculative funds. Guan added that China would try to cut its trade surplus to 3 percent of gross domestic product in the next five years as part of efforts to reduce global economic imbalances."
read more: Reuters
1/20/2010
According to the Ministry of Finance - Norway, "The Ministry of Finance has decided to exclude 17 companies that produce tobacco from the Government Pension Fund Global (GPFG), based on a recommendation from the Fund’s Council on Ethics. The divestment of shares in these companies has now been completed.
“When the Graver Committee proposed the current ethical guidelines, there was debate on whether to exclude tobacco producers from the Fund. Under some doubt, it was decided that tobacco should not be excluded. After the Graver Committee submitted its recommendation, there have been international and national developments through the entry into force of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control and the tightening of the Norwegian Tobacco Act. We have taken these changes on board and believe – amongst others in light of the consultative input in connection with the evaluation of the ethical guidelines – that it is timely to exclude tobacco from the Fund. It is important that the ethical guidelines reflect at all times what can be considered to be commonly held values of the owners of the Fund,” says Minister of Finance Sigbjørn Johnsen.
In Report No. 20 to the Storting on the Management of the GPFG, the Ministry proposed excluding tobacco producers from the Fund. The move was supported by the Storting. The specific delimitation of the tobacco criterion was described in the National Budget for 2010. The recommendation was made in line with this. On the basis of the index providers’ industrial classification of companies in the GPFG’s equity and fixed-income portfolio (FTSE All Cap and Barclays Global Aggregate) and information on the companies’ own websites, the Council on Ethics has identified 17 companies engaged in activities affected by the criterion for exclusion of tobacco producers. Since the companies themselves state that they are primarily engaged in tobacco production, the Council on Ethics has not found it necessary to contact the companies to confirm this.
The excluded companies are: Alliance One International Inc., Altria Group Inc., British American Tobacco BHD, British American Tobacco Plc., Gudang Garam tbk pt., Imperial Tobacco Group Plc., ITC Ltd., Japan Tobacco Inc., KT&G Corp, Lorillard Inc., Philip Morris International Inc., Philip Morris Cr AS., Reynolds American Inc., Souza Cruz SA, Swedish Match AB, Universal Corp VA and Vector Group Ltd.
In drafting a new criterion on screening tobacco producers, the Ministry of Finance placed particular emphasis on finding a delimitation that fits well with the structure of the current ethical guidelines, including existing rules for negative screening of certain weapons manufacturers.
On this basis, a rule has been adopted that in principle will exclude all production of tobacco, regardless of the percentage of business represented by tobacco production. This means that it will be possible to exclude a few more companies than those listed under the industrial classification “tobacco” by the index providers. The new screening criterion for tobacco production is limited to tobacco products and does not include associated products such as filters and flavour additives.
The Council on Ethics has given notice that it may return with further recommendations to exclude companies that produce tobacco."
read more: Ministry of Finance - Norway
1/16/2010
According to BI-ME, "Kuwait and France on Thursday signed an initial agreement on nuclear cooperation that includes exchanging expertise on the field, the official news agency KUNA reported. The agreement encourages the peaceful use of atomic energy to bring in vital energy resources such as electricity, the report said, without providing any details of the cooperation. Earlier on Wednesday KUNA had reported that Kuwait may be interested in acquiring a stake in France's nuclear giant Areva, citing unidentified industry sources.
'Areva says it needs the capital injection to finance the expected rapid development in the nuclear market,' Kuna said.
The news agency added that Anne Lauvergeon, the CEO of Areva, did not give details on ongoing contacts with potential investors, 'but industry sources have said that Kuwait could be interested in taking a stake in Areva'.
Lauvergeon reportedly said Wednesday that the talks taking place with potential partners are at a government-to-government level and that a number of partners were involved. In March, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defence Sheikh Jaber Moubarak Al-Hamad Al-Sabah said Kuwait will cooperate with France in the field of nuclear power, hinting it could take a stake in the nuclear group Areva. The Financial Times also said in March that the French government was considering opening the share capital of Areva to Middle Eastern investment funds with a view to reinforcing its political influence and the nuclear group's prospects in the region. Exploratory talks had been held about the possibility of sovereign wealth funds buying minority stakes of 1%-5% in Areva, which is majority owned by the French government, the FT said, citing people close to the matter."
read more: Business Intelligence Middle East
1/14/2010
An excerpt from the interview, " Question: So far ADIA has mostly bought up to 4.9 percent of companies’ stakes in order to avoid public notice. Can you imagine acquiring higher stakes in future and possibly getting seats on the boards?
Public attention is not a factor in our investment strategy. We have no expertise in managing businesses directly, and have made it clear that we have no interest in doing so. As a matter of policy, ADIA does not exercise its voting rights except on rare occasions to protect our financial interests or against motions that may be detrimental to shareholders as a whole. This approach reduces the need for us to buy large stakes in companies or to take board seats. ADIA’s philosophy since its creation has been to build a broadly diversified portfolio of investments. Our expertise lies in areas such as portfolio construction, investment strategies, selection of managers and identifying long-term trends that will enable us to generate superior returns. We express our view on a company by either investing in it or not. We have worked very hard over the past 30-plus years to build open and trusted relationships with governments and regulators around the world that are based on these simple principles."
read more: Handelsblatt Interview
1/13/2010
Sponsored Conference
The Third Annual Alternative Investments Conference at UNC will be held on February 25, 2010 in Chapel Hill, NC. We have an incredible lineup of keynote speakers including David Bonderman from TPG, Mark Yusko from Morgan Creek Capital Management, and Mark Patterson from MatlinPatterson Global Advisers. We also have a great lineup of panel speakers from every part of the alternative investment landscape. To learn more information and to register for the conference, visit: www.unc-aic.com
1/13/2010
The Moscow Times reports that, "Money from the National Welfare Fund will be used to finance Vneshekonombank's infrastructure projects, an arrangement that is profitable for the Finance Ministry and the state corporation but also carries significant risk. In December, the ministry closed ahead of schedule a 175 billion ruble ($5.9 billion) deposit at VEB — which the state corporation received in October 2008 to support the stock market — and opened a foreign currency deposit. It deposited $2 billion from the National Welfare Fund (which totaled $91.56 billion, as of Jan. 1) at a rate of 2.75 percentage points above the London interbank offered rate. The loan must be returned July 1, 2011, and VEB must make interest payments every six months.
The funds were placed to diversify and earn a higher return for the National Welfare Fund, the ministry said in a statement. "It's a profitable investment. The rate is higher than at the Central Bank, especially since LIBOR is going to rise," a high-level Finance Ministry source said.
The six-month dollar LIBOR rate was 0.4 percent Tuesday. "
read more: Moscow Times
1/12/2010
Marketwatch reports that, "An official with China's sovereign wealth fund moved foreign-exchange rates Tuesday after reported comments from a speech in Beijing that were dollar-bullish and yen- and gold-bearish. China Investment Corp. executive Peng Junming said that the U.S. dollar was likely to appreciate from current levels, and that China and the U.S. were on track to raise interest rates in the second half of the year, according a Reuters report.
"I think the dollar is at its bottom now. There will be very limited space for the dollar to drop further," the report quoted him as saying. "The yen is what, I think, has the worst outlook. The yen will continue to drop, unlike the dollar, which will not serve for long as a source of funding carry trades."
The greenback rose more than half a yen to a session high near 92.40 yen on Peng's comments, and later gave back some of the gains after Peng said his speech at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences reflected his personal views, Reuters said.Junming also was cited assaying the gold prices were inflated were too expensive for China to increase its bullion purchases for now."
read more: Market Watch
1/10/2010
Reuters reports, the Sunday Telegraph, "cited unnamed sources as saying the consortium was working on a 4 billion pound ($6.4 billion) bid for a network, owned by French utility EDF, which distributes power to millions of homes in the south of England. Goldman Sachs and Lexicon Partners are advising the consortium, the paper said, adding information packs had yet to be sent to prospective buyers, suggesting the first round of bidding was still some way off. None of the parties mentioned were available for comment."
read more: Reuters
1/8/2010
Wall Street Journal reports, "Areva SA is poised to raise some €1 billion ($1.44 billion) by selling its stake in a French nickel-mining firm, people familiar with the matter said, in what would be the latest move by the French nuclear-power group to raise money for a vast nuclear plant renewal plan and expansion into alternative energies. The state-owned Areva plans to sell its 25.78% stake in Eramet to France's Fonds Strategique d'Investissement -- a sovereign fund created last year by the French government to help strategically important companies -- by the end of the first quarter, according to one of the people familiar with the matter. Spokespeople for Areva and Eramet declined to comment."
read more: Wall Street Journal
1/3/2010
Wall Street Journal reports, "A year after setting aside 14.1 billion Brazilian reals (US$8.2 billion) for establishment of a sovereign wealth fund, Brazil's government Tuesday formalized rules for the fund's operation. Brazil's federal treasury is now authorized to sell domestic government securities held in the fund to date in order to make new investments.
According to information published in the country's federal register, investments made by the fund abroad must yield a return equal to or greater than the six-month London interbank offered rate, or Libor. Investments locally must yield the equivalent of Brazil's TJLP long-term interest rate, currently at 6% annually.
The executive decree also states the fund's investments must be made in assets that have investment grade ratings from a minimum of two ratings agencies, and that the government must issue a report twice a year to Brazil's congress detailing changes in the fund's asset values. Under legislation approved by Brazil's congress in December 2008, the fund was established to invest in domestic and foreign securities, create public savings and support investments in projects of strategic interest to Brazil abroad. Traders in Brazilian markets said the news of the fund's regulation Tuesday pressured the local currency, the real, as investors positioned for the government's possible entrance into local markets as a buyer of foreign currency for use in the fund."
read more: Wall Street Journal
12/27/2009
Save 20% off Initial Database License Price, Pre-Order Today
The Sovereign Wealth Fund Transaction Database (SWFTD) is a dedicated database product that tracks sovereign wealth fund transactions from 1986 till present. With over 1,000 recorded transactions in real estate, listed equities, unlisted equities, and other unique acquisitions, we aim to be the most comprehensive source of SWF transactions.
PURCHASE NOW | View Sample Entries
Launch Date: 1/22/2010 | **Download Format - Microsoft Excel**
Pre-Order Price US$ 3,600 (Save 20% from US$ 4,500 on 1/22/2010) for Initial Database License
Quarterly Subscription for Transaction Updates US$ 250 per quarter
Over 1,000 recorded transactions, the Sovereign Wealth Fund Transaction Database (SWFTD)is the industry standard for information on sovereign wealth fund transactions in real estate, listed equities, unlisted equities, and other unique acquisitions. We have the most comprehensive database dedicated to sovereign wealth fund transactions.
Our research team scours and scrubs the data to put the most relevant information into one single database.
Why subscribe to the SWFTD?
 Stay informed on SWF deal size and trends
Identify attractive types of investments and sectors
Find out who the big buyers are
Compare reliable data from globally-consistent, local sources
Analyze and examine opportunities with a large universe of transaction data.
read more: Sovereign Wealth Fund Transaction Database (SWFTD)
12/27/2009
Business Week reports, "Glencore International AG, the biggest commodity trader, sold as much as $2.2 billion of convertible bonds to investors including BlackRock Inc. in what may be the first step toward an initial public offering.
The bonds, which are due December 2014, are convertible into Glencore shares upon an IPO or “other pre-determined qualifying events,” the Baar, Switzerland-based trader said today in an e-mailed statement. The terms of the bonds give Glencore a pre-conversion equity value of $35 billion, it said.
Other buyers of the bonds include Government of Singapore Investment Corp., Greenwich, Connecticut-based private equity investor First Reserve Corp., and Zijin Mining Group Co., China’s third-largest copper producer, Glencore said. Glencore, led by Chief Executive Officer Ivan Glasenberg, saw net income slide 56 percent to $1.8 billion in the first nine months of 2009 after commodities fell. It sold its Prodeco coal assets in Colombia in March for $2 billion to Xstrata Plc, in which Glencore has a 34 percent stake. Glencore will likely use proceeds from the bonds to take up its option to buy back Prodeco, Barclays Capital credit analyst Neil Beddall said.
“That’s why they pressed the button on this investment now,” Beddall said by phone from London. “Longer term, the IPO will be used to pay out the senior partners and to alleviate the liquidity concerns some had over the business.
The offering was increased from between $1.5 billion and $2 billion because of “strong” demand, Glencore said.
“This transaction, in which Glencore is opening up its equity capital to outside investors, marks an important milestone as we embark on the next stage of our corporate development,” Glencore said in the statement."
read more: Business Week
12/27/2009
Taipei Times reports, "A US-British asset management giant and a Chinese sovereign wealth fund have agreed to take part in the Hong Kong initial public offering (IPO) of the world’s largest aluminum producer, UC Rusal, a report said yesterday. Black Rock and China Investment Corp (CIC) have given their initial agreement to take part in the IPO along with Russian state banks whose interest was already confirmed, daily Vedomosti said. Quoting bankers close to the operation, the newspaper said that Rusal directors had late on Wednesday agreed on a valuation for the Russian metals giant of US$16 billion to US$22 billion for the IPO. Vedomosti said this would make Rusal — whose majority shareholder is the oligarch Oleg Deripaska — the largest aluminum firm worldwide by capitalization, ahead of US firm Alcoa, which is valued at US$15.9 billion.
Sources said earlier this month that Rusal won conditional approval for the IPO from the Hong Kong bourse, ending weeks of uncertainty over whether its billions of dollars of debt would thwart the plan. Rusal plans to float 10 percent of its shares valued at around US$2 billion in by far the biggest IPO by a Russian company since the economic crisis.
Vedomosti said Rusal was now planning to set the IPO price and complete the transaction by Jan. 20. Pre-marketing will start on Jan. 5 and a roadshow on Jan. 11. Around one-third of the shares will go to Europe-based funds and another third to Chinese funds. The Hong Kong bourse is not expected to allow private investors to take part. The involvement of investors like Black Rock — which has US$1.44 trillion of assets under management — should attract smaller funds and mean Rusal has no problem attracting interest in the IPO, Vedomosti said.
Rusal and Black Rock declined to comment, Vedomosti said."
read more: Taipei Times
12/27/2009
The National reports, "The Pakistan government is offering investors in the Emirates its stakes in nine corporations, including the country’s largest lender and its biggest oil and gas exploration firm, as it seeks to reduce debt.
Officials from Pakistan’s privatisation commission along with JP Morgan, the lead manager on the project, recently concluded a series of presentations to investment houses including the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world, as well as Emirates Investment Authority, Abu Dhabi Investment Corporation and Invest AD.
'Eventually the government will sell all its shareholding,' said Waqar Ahmed Khan, the privatisation minister. 'We are doing the number crunching, developing baseline formulas and doing evaluations for a number of projects.'
The holdings in the first batch of companies are expected to be sold within the first half of next year, he said. The government may sell its holdings in firms including the National Bank of Pakistan, which has assets of more than US$10 billion (Dh36.73bn). Oil and Gas Development Corporation and Pakistan Petroleum, two oil and gas exploration companies, the energy firms Faisalabad Electricity, Kot Addu Power and Jamshoro Power, Pakistan Post Office and State Life Corporation of Pakistan, the country’s biggest life insurer, are also on offer."
read more: The National
12/23/2009
Australian Business reports, "In 2020, the Future Fund will be Australia's biggest property landlord as the $67 billion listed property trust sector cedes its dominance to big sovereign wealth funds and super fund investors. Among other big trends, the property industry will be grappling with population growth, an ageing population, climate change and the challenge to supply infrastructure. In Australia, the annual population growth rate doubled in the past 10 years to 443,000 in the year to June. At the same time, the country attracted 290,000 migrants in net terms.
"I don't think that will significantly ease up," demographer Bernard Salt says.
This month, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announced state governments and local councils will have to agree to better standards of planning in capital cities to qualify for future federal infrastructure funding to ensure they can properly handle growth, with the population set to reach 35 million by 2049. In the corporate world, analysts expect big superannuation funds and the increasingly dominant sovereign wealth funds to become landlords of much more property. The race is already on for Australian property companies to snag these big-ticket investors as partners. Lend Lease chief executive Steve McCann and his team are in the box seat as retail property fund manager for Australia's $64 billion Future Fund with a joint bid to take over ING's unlisted $1.4bn retail fund."
read more: Australian Business
12/20/2009
CNBC Asia reports, "Chinese sovereign wealth fund, China Investment Corp, may get $200 billion in new funds from the country's foreign exchange hoard, the Financial Times reported Monday. The amount would be similar to the $200 billion CIC received when it was set up in 2007 but a final decision has yet to be made, said FT quoting unidentified government officials and people familiar with the $300 billion fund. A CIC spokesman in Beijing was not immediately available for comment. China's foreign exchange reserves are the largest in the world and rose by $141 billion to $2.27 trillion in the third quarter."
read more: CNBC Asia
12/17/2009
November 2007, ADIA received equity units that are to convert into Citigroup common shares at a price of $31.83 per share between March 2010 and September 2011. Citigroup's share price was $3.20 at on 12/17/2009. ADIA wants to pull out of the deal or will seek over $4 Billion in damages. More details about the claim were not made public.
An ADIA spokesman said: 'It is the policy of ADIA to pursue its legal rights fully. ADIA declines to comment further due to binding confidentiality obligations, which ADIA intends to respect.'
Citigroup said in a statement, "New York – On December 15, 2009, an arbitration claim was filed against Citi in New York by the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), which purchased equity units from the company in November 2007. The units obligate ADIA to purchase a total of $7.5 billion of common equity on specified dates in 2010 and 2011. The arbitration claim alleges fraudulent misrepresentations in connection with the sale and seeks rescission of the investment agreement or damages in excess of $4 billion. Citi believes the allegations are entirely without merit and intends to defend against them vigorously."
read more: Citigroup Press Release
12/16/2009
The Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute – Consensus Demand Meter is an innovative indicator to track what sovereign wealth funds are demanding in the next three quarters from that relative start date. For Q4 Y2009 (End of December 2009) going forward three months, this Demand Meter indicates how select asset allocations, sectors, and investment strategies rank.
A score of 10, indicates that this area is attractive for the majority or large portion of SWFs. A score of 1, means that SWFs will most likely try to lower exposure from that sector, allocation or strategy. There are many diverse types of sovereign wealth funds with differing objectives, priorities, and goals. This is purely a consensus indicator derived from our Institute's research and analysis. Not all strategies, asset allocations, and sectors are included in this indicator.
Our data is gathered through various sources:
Internal sources
Public announcements
Executive investment professionals
Market & economic research
12/15/2009
According to the AP, "Abu Dhabi's biggest sovereign wealth fund has bought more than 10 percent of the Hyatt Hotels Corp. shares floated by the iconic hotelier last month.
Chicago-based Hyatt disclosed the sale Monday in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The deal was made public on the same day oil-rich Abu Dhabi agreed to pump $10 billion in bailout funds into its struggling neighbor Dubai. The filing said the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority bought nearly 4.8 million, or 10.9 percent, of Hyatt's Class A common shares. Its overall stake in the company is considerably lower, however, because the wealthy Pritzker family holds the bulk of other stocks known as Class B shares that give it voting control over the company.
ADIA spokesman Euart Glendinning confirmed the purchase Tuesday. He said the fund intends to remain a minority shareholder. Financial terms were not disclosed. Hyatt shares closed at $29.05 apiece Friday, the last trading day before the deal became public. At that price, ADIA's stake is worth about $139.4 million. ADIA is the largest of several investment funds Abu Dhabi uses to invest its oil wealth. It is perhaps best known for agreeing to pump $7.5 billion in Citigroup Inc. in late 2007.
The size of its holdings has not been made public, but it is believed to be the world's largest sovereign wealth fund. Estimates of its size have ranged from less than $400 billion to $875 billion and up.
Abu Dhabi, like Dubai, is one of seven semiautonomous sheikdoms that make up the United Arab Emirates, among OPEC's top five oil producers. It serves as the federation's capital, with control over the presidency and nearly all the country's oil reserves. Hyatt raised $950 million last month when it floated 38 million Class A shares — the type bought by ADIA — in one of the year's few initial public offerings. Additional Class A shares were made available to the bank's underwriters. Hyatt was founded in 1957 by Jay Pritzker and first taken public in 1962. It later returned to private hands, where it remained for more than a quarter century until last month's IPO. It owns, operates, manages or franchises 415 Hyatt-branded properties, including the Hyatt, Park Hyatt, Hyatt Regency and Grand Hyatt chains, in 45 countries."
read more: AP
12/14/2009
According to the Press Release, "The Board of Directors of Springer Science+Business Media (Springer Group), composed of Springer executives and representatives of Cinven and Candover, have agreed to accept an offer from and have signed a sales agreement with a partnership of EQT, a private equity investor based in Sweden, and GIC, a Singapore-based co-investor, for all shares of the Springer Group. The Springer Group is the world’s second largest scientific, technical and medical (STM) publisher and a leader in the digitalization of scientific information.
Furthermore, EQT and GIC have agreed to inject new equity into the Springer Group, to strengthen its balance sheet and decrease the overall cost of funding. A refinancing agreement with a syndicate of banks will give the Springer Group medium-term stability by removing imminent potential refinancing issues.
The acquisition is subject to examination and approval by European, US and national competition authorities. This process is expected to be finished by mid to late January or early February 2010.
Derk Haank, Springer’s CEO, said, “The Springer Executive Management Team has had constructive and collegial discussions with EQT. I am confident that this marks the beginning of a new exciting and successful chapter for us and for our new partners at EQT and GIC. The sale will allow us to move our ambitious and ongoing 'e' strategy forward, and to invest more heavily for our stakeholder’s benefit – this is the best solution for the company, our employees and shareholders.”
Financial advisors to the Springer Group were Goldman Sachs with Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer acting as legal counsel.
Springer Science+Business Media is a leading global scientific publisher, delivering quality content through innovative information products and services. The company is also a trusted provider of local-language professional publications in Europe, especially in Germany and the Netherlands. In the science, technology and medicine (STM) sector, the group publishes around 2,000 journals and more than 6,500 new books a year, and has the largest STM eBook Collection worldwide. Springer has operations in about 20 countries in Europe, the USA, and Asia, and has more than 5,000 employees. In 2008, it generated annual sales of around EUR 892 million."
read more: Press Release
12/14/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Australia’s sovereign wealth fund said it may join two Canadian pension funds in a A$6.8 billion ($6.2 billion) bid for toll-road owner Transurban Group after an initial offer was rejected five weeks ago. The A$64.3 billion Future Fund is in talks with Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, the Australian fund said today in a statement. Australia’s biggest toll-road company rejected an A$5.25 offer on Nov. 5, which was 20 percent higher than the previous closing price.
Canada Pension and Ontario Teachers, with almost $200 billion of assets, already own a combined 28 percent of Transurban, according to Bloomberg data. Even with the Future Fund’s potential backing, a higher offer may be needed to win support from Transurban, which owns toll roads including the Pocahontas 895 in Virginia and the Hills M2 in New South Wales.
“It gives more firepower to the bid,” said Andrew Chambers, an analyst at Austock Group Ltd. in Melbourne with a “buy” rating on Transurban. “We wouldn’t be telling people to accept a bid of A$5.25, regardless of who’s offering it.”
No commitment or understanding has yet been reached by the Future Fund with the Canadian funds, and discussions are preliminary, Will Hetherton, head of public affairs at the fund, said in the statement."
read more: Bloomberg
12/7/2009
According to the NY Times, "When Mayor Richard M. Daley traveled to Abu Dhabi in February, his office announced that the trip was intended to sell Chicago as a place to do business. Left unsaid was that that Persian Gulf emirate was about to become one of the biggest investors in a deal to lease Chicago’s parking meters for 75 years.
A private company projects a net income of about $58 million in 2010 from the city's meters.
The city signed the now-controversial, $1.15 billion lease with a new company called Chicago Parking Meters LLC in February, and city officials said two funds of the Morgan Stanley investment fund made up 99 percent of the new company, with “several other entities” sharing the remaining 1 percent.
In fact, a Chicago News Cooperative investigation has found that investment arms of the oil-rich Abu Dhabi government hold more than a 25 percent stake in the company that privatized the city’s 36,000 parking meters. German financial company Allianz also has a large minority interest, and the remaining 50.1 percent is held by partnerships assembled by Morgan Stanley."
read more: NY Times
12/7/2009
KUWAIT’S SOVEREIGN wealth fund has made a profit of $1.1 billion (€739 million) after selling its 5 per cent stake in Citigroup for $4.1 billion less than two years after acquiring preference shares in the largest US bank during the global financial crisis.
Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA) converted preferred stock in Citigroup that it purchased for $3 billion last year into common shares and sold them, earning a 37 per cent return on its investment. The sale comes as Citigroup is set to intensify efforts to break free from US government emergency bank funding programmes.
Citigroup is racing against the clock to convince US authorities that it be allowed to repay $20 billion of bail-out funds, with insiders and regulators arguing that unless the bank acts within the next 10 days it will have to wait for more than a month.
read more: Irish Times
12/3/2009
As part of the investment, CIC will buy a 2.3% stake in the private-equity group's management company, Apax Partners Worldwide LLP, which is one of the largest of its kind in Europe, the Financial Times reported, without citing sources. The move shows China is still eager to invest abroad, even though it has been stymied in its attempts to do so in the past, the report said.
The deal is seen as unusual in that some of the funds currently held by Apex could be transferred to CIC, the report said. Two years ago, Apex raised 11.2 billion euros for its Apex Europe VII fund, one of the largest buyout funds in Europe, and has already invested about half of this, the Financial Times reported.
read more: MarketWatch
11/30/2009
According to the Government of Australia - Assistant Treasurer, "The Assistant Treasurer, Senator Nick Sherry, has today released a consultation paper on the proposed changes to the income tax law to formalise the existing tax practice of exempting certain income earned by foreign governments.
"Currently, there are around 50 sovereign wealth funds around the world with approximately US$3.8 trillion under management and it's expected that this will rise to around US$10 trillion by 2015," said the Assistant Treasurer.
"The Rudd Government wants to provide certainty to these funds when they're considering investing in Australia, and this measure will greatly assist in delivering that outcome."
"The proposed changes will make Australia a more attractive destination for sovereign investment and will also contribute to the Government's financial hub strategy."
The consultation paper seeks comments on the broad legislative design principles of the proposed changes, including:
the appropriate definition of a "foreign government";
how non-commercial (passive) income should be defined to ensure that it can be easily distinguished from commercial (active) income, thereby securing a level playing field for competing Australian businesses;
what effect should the derivation of active income have on the tax treatment of an entity's passive income; and
the range of taxes that should be captured under the sovereign immunity legislation.
"We are strongly committed to close consultation with industry on tax measures. We will undertake a further consultation on the draft legislation, which is expected to be introduced in the first half of 2010," said the Assistant Treasurer."
read more: Government of Australia - Assistant Treasurer | Consultation Paper
11/27/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Angola is considering setting up an oil fund modeled after Norway’s sovereign wealth fund to manage its petroleum wealth, Aftenposten reported, without saying where it got the information. Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere discussed the issue with his Angolan counterpart Assuncao dos Anjos during a visit yesterday to the African nation, the Oslo-based newspaper said."
read more: Bloomberg
11/24/2009
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority said today that it has appointed Tom Arnold as Head of Americas, Real Estate, with immediate effect.
Mr. Arnold, 51, will be responsible for developing and implementing ADIA’s real estate investment strategy in the Americas region. He will be based in Abu Dhabi and report to Bill Schwab, Global Head of Real Estate.
With a career spanning more than 25 years, Mr. Arnold joins ADIA from Cerberus Capital Management, where he was a Managing Director since 2003 with responsibility for the origination and execution of real estate, lending, and private equity transactions. Prior to this, Mr. Arnold spent five years at ING as a Managing Director and senior real estate acquisitions officer, overseeing portfolio management and coordinating financing facilities. He also previously served as a senior acquisitions officer and strategic asset manager at Credit Suisse and Salomon Brothers (now Citigroup). He began his career in the early 1980s as a lawyer specialising in securities, tax, and real estate matters.
Commenting on the appointment, Bill Schwab, Global Head of Real Estate at ADIA, said: “Tom is a highly respected investment professional with wide-ranging experience and deep relationships across the industry. His arrival will further strengthen our team and play a crucial role in the development of ADIA’s strategy in the important Americas region.”
Mr. Arnold said: “ADIA is a unique organisation with a well-deserved reputation as a prudent and sophisticated investor and trusted partner. In real estate, ADIA has been particularly successful in nurturing partnerships with other leading investors that are mutually beneficial while remaining consistent with its strategic vision. I feel very fortunate to be part of such a world class institution.”
read more: Abu Dhabi Investment Authority
11/22/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Qatar, the world’s largest producer of liquefied natural gas, expects the construction of a railway system will cost 17 billion euros ($25.3 billion) as the Persian Gulf state seeks improved transport links with its neighbors.
Qatari Diar Real Estate Investment Co. and German state- owned rail operator Deutsche Bahn AG formed Qatar Railways Development Co. today to build the network in three phases by 2026, Qatari Diar Chief Executive Officer Ghanim bin Saad al- Saad said.
Financing and the budget for the project will be announced very soon, he told reporters in Doha. Qatari Diar is part of the country’s sovereign wealth fund.
Gulf states are channeling crude-oil and gas earnings into railways and airports as they develop infrastructure to help economic development and attract foreign investors and tourists. Dubai, the second-biggest of seven sheikhdoms that make up the United Arab Emirates, in September opened the first metro system in the Gulf Arab countries. Oil-rich Abu Dhabi is conducting studies to build a rail system in the U.A.E. capital.
'The signing of this agreement shows that German expertise and German technology in the transport sector are in demand the world over,' Transport Minister Peter Ramsauer said today in a statement.
Qatar’s rail network will integrate projects such as a high-speed link between the gas-rich emirate’s capital Doha and its airport, and a link with Bahrain via a causeway, the companies said in a statement. Qatar will also get passenger and freight links between Doha and the industrial cities of Ras Laffan and Mesaieed, freight lines to other countries and a metro system in the capital.Qatari Diar owns 51 percent of the rail company with Deutsche Bahn holding the rest."
read more: Bloomberg
11/20/2009
According to the Wall Street Journal, "Stanford University has received bids totaling more than $1 billion for its large block of hard-to-sell investments that it put up for sale last month, a figure at the high end of the school's early expectations, according to people familiar with the matter. But some of the bids, in areas such as private equity, include tough conditions that could make them less appealing and test how badly Stanford wants to raise cash. Stanford has informed bidders to submit "best and final" offers by Thursday, these people said. Some bidders, however, expect there to be some wiggle room for finalists to amend their offers.
A Stanford spokeswoman declined to comment.
China's sovereign-wealth fund, China Investment Corp., is among the investment firms to make an offer. CIC declined to comment."
read more: Wall Street Journal
11/19/2009
According to the China Investment Corporation's Press Release, " China Investment Corporation (“CIC”) today signed a binding framework agreement with GCL-Poly Energy Holdings Limited (“GCL-Poly”) for the subscription of approximately 3,108 million shares of GCL-Poly at a price of HK$1.79 per share. The total investment is around HK$5.5 billion. The subscription is conditional upon, among other things, the signing of definitive documentation and approval by GCL-Poly’s shareholders. Upon completion of the subscription, CIC will own an approximately 20% stake in GCL-Poly on a fully-diluted basis. CIC and GCL-Poly intend to establish a joint venture to invest in and develop photovoltaic projects or other solar energy projects based on an initial capitalization of US$500 million."
read more: China Investment Corporation Press Release
11/15/2009
According to Business 24-7, "Protectionist barriers aimed at capital-rich sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) could backfire on the fragile global economy, top executives of major state investment firms warned yesterday. The sovereign funds have the capital needed by affected economies to recover from the global crisis but governments may come under domestic pressure to impose protectionist measures, they said. Tony Tan, Deputy Chairman of the Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC), said the biggest danger facing the world economy in coming years is protectionist sentiment, which may be stoked by high unemployment rates. Tan, speaking at a business forum on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific summit, said protectionism could spread from the trade arena to financial markets.
"This could manifest itself in the form of protectionist measures not only in world trade but also in financial markets and impede the free flow of funds," he said.
"If nothing else, this could derail the global economic recovery which all of us are hoping for," said the GIC deputy chairman.
Jin Liqun, from the China Investment Corporation (CIC), also cautioned against barring investments from government-owned funds. "The sovereign wealth funds will be playing a big role in rebalancing the process but we need co-operation from the recipient countries," said Jin, CIC's chairman of the board of supervisors.
"There's nothing we can do if we are barred from doing our jobs in your countries or when hurdles are very high for us to overcome," he said.
Jin said sovereign funds can play a major role in restructuring economies.
"Countries need a cushion in undertaking major economic restructuring and provisional funding is of course crucial," he said, adding that the global recovery was not irreversible.
When the global crisis unfolded, SWFs emerged as a source of crucial capital, especially to Western financial firms and banks in dire need of fresh funding. Singapore's GIC, which manages the city-state's reserves of more than $100 billion (Dh367bn), was one of the rescuers of US-based Citigroup and Swiss banking giant UBS. Kuwait Investment Authority's (KIA) Managing Director Bader Al Saad told the forum that SWFs have collectively pumped $90bn into financial institutions in the last few years.
"I think now we are in a new era of engagement," said Al Saad.
"There is a unique opportunity for the sovereign wealth funds to represent themselves as investors in the world... They are a long-term investor," he said.
Al Saad also said perceptions that SWFs were a source of destabilisation in financial markets and that investments were driven by political agendas could not be further from the truth.
"Most of their transactions are cash transactions so there is a real economy and it shows that they are responsible investors," he said.
"They are a source of stability and last but not least, they are strategic investors... On top of that, they never make hostile takeovers.""
read more: Business 24-7
11/13/2009
According to Wall Street Journal, "China's sovereign-wealth fund has brought in a China-born portfolio manager with U.S. experience to run its hedge-fund investments, according ++to people familiar with the situation, marking its highest-profile hire so far.
Bill Lu, formerly a portfolio manager at U.S. hedge fund Tudor Investment Corp., has become a managing director at China Investment Corp. with responsibility for investments in hedge funds and hedge-fund-like investments in public-market securities, according to these people.
Mr. Lu, the third official to oversee CIC's hedge-fund program since 2007, takes over the hedge-fund portfolio from Felix Chee, a Singapore native and former chief executive of the University of Toronto's endowment fund. Mr. Chee is continuing to work at CIC as a special adviser to CIC's chief investment officer, Gao Xiqing, according to a person familiar with the situation. It is unclear what prompted the change in Mr. Chee's responsibilities. CIC's recruitment efforts have so far focused mostly on taking staff from other Chinese government agencies to fill senior roles, hiring junior staff from investment banks to fill junior spots, and borrowing staff to fill in other gaps. Because it is state-owned, CIC isn't able to offer salaries or bonus structures comparable to international financial firms."
read more: Wall Street Journal
11/11/2009
According to Reuters, "Sovereign wealth fund the Government of Singapore Investment Corp [GIC.UL] regards downside protection as important when considering investments in infrastructure projects, a senior executive said on Wednesday.
Teh Kok Peng, president of GIC Special Investments, said infrastructure provides bond-like, rather than equity-like, returns so the protection offered to investors and the regulatory framework are things the Singapore fund looks at.
'The returns are not that great because they are regulated,' he said at a World Bank conference in Singapore."
read more: Reuters
11/10/2009
According to the Wall Street Journal, "Qatar's sovereign investment fund Tuesday sold 25 million preference shares in German auto maker Volkswagen AG (VOW.XE), raising EUR1.5 billion, but still plans to build its voting stake in the company. The fund, VW's third-largest shareholder, said it would sell the shares, which don't have voting rights, to boost their liquidity. However, the move comes after a recent fall in their value and as VW is about to issue new preference shares, which would dilute Qatar's holding. The fund said it still wants to increase its holding of VW's ordinary shares, which have voting rights, to 17%. Qatar had a 6.78% stake Aug. 28, according to VW's Web site.
Qatar Holding LLC's sale of VW shares follows a similar move by the Persian Gulf sheikdom regarding its holdings in Barclays PLC (BCS, BARC.LN). After helping pump billions of fresh capital into Barclays last year, Qatar in late October sold down a stake in the bank worth more than $2 billion at the time.
A person familiar with Qatar's thinking at the time said the move was made to book profits after Barclays shares recovered sharply from their financial-crisis lows. Despite the selloff, Qatar said it would continue to be a long-term investor in the bank.
Qatari officials weren't immediately available to comment Tuesday. In a statement, the fund said it plans to remain a long-term strategic investor in VW and supports the auto maker's plans to merge with sports car maker Porsche Automobil Holding SE (PAH3.XE).
'Volkswagen remains a key investment asset for (the fund) and we have been pleased with our investment in Volkswagen so far,' Qatar Holding said."
read more: Wall Street Journal
11/9/2009
According to Reuters, "Angola's oil industry is booming as money pours in after the end of three decades of civil war, and officials say output could increase by as much as two-thirds over the next five years. Buoyed by a scramble for energy and raw materials by China and other emerging nations, oil companies are spending tens of billions of dollars drilling oil and gas wells deep below the Atlantic many miles off the African coast. Production capacity has increased steadily over the last two years and oil analysts say Angola could now comfortably pump at least 2 million barrels per day (bpd) and is increasingly only held back by political constraints. Angola is a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), holding the presidency of the 12-member grouping this year, and has been limiting output with other OPEC states to help stabilize oil prices in the wake of the global economic crisis. But dozens of new Angolan oilfields will come on stream between 2011 and 2015 and oil analysts expect output to increase steadily to between 2.5 and 3.0 million over this period.
'By 2015, Angola should be looking at oil production closer to 3 million bpd,' said Thomas Pearmain, African energy analyst at IHS Global Insight. 'Production will be pretty flat from now through until about 2011 and then we will see a number of very big projects come on over the following three to four years.'"
read more: Reuters
11/8/2009
According to the China Investment Corporation - Press Release, "China Investment Corporation (“CIC”) today made an investment through a wholly-owned subsidiary in the amount of USD 1.58 billion in AES Corporation (“AES”). At close, CIC will acquire 125.5 million shares of AES stock for USD 12.6 per share, representing approximately 15% equity interest in the company. According to the investment agreement, CIC will nominate one director to the AES board.
CIC has also signed a letter of intent with AES to invest an additional USD 571 million for an approximate 35% interest in the wind generation business of AES."
According to the AES Press Release, "The AES Corporation (NYSE: AES) today announced a binding stock purchase agreement with a wholly-owned investment subsidiary of China Investment Corporation (CIC) to raise $1.58 billion of new equity to fund growth opportunities and extend its global leadership in the power sector. At close, CIC will acquire 125.5 million shares of AES stock for $12.60 per share for an approximate 15 percent stake in the company. AES also announced the signing of a letter of intent with CIC to raise an additional $571 million of equity for an approximate 35 percent interest in its wind generation business. AES, with headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, owns and operates a diverse portfolio of power generation and distribution businesses in 29 countries. More than two-thirds of AES’ revenue is generated outside of the United States. AES seeks to invest in high-growth areas of the power sector, including renewable energy and emerging markets.
CIC is a long-term institutional investor operated on a commercial basis. Following the closing, CIC will nominate a director to join the AES board, which currently has ten members.
Paul Hanrahan, President and Chief Executive Officer of AES, stated, “We see tremendous potential for growth in meeting demand for affordable and sustainable power throughout the world. Having CIC as a partner will enhance our financial flexibility, provide capital needed to move more quickly on our project development pipeline, and offer broader access to high quality investment opportunities.”
The stock purchase agreement is subject to completion of regulatory reviews and receipt of applicable approvals, including the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) and the antitrust review under Hart-Scott-Rodino Act. Approvals are expected to be completed during the first half of 2010. The letter of intent is concerning CIC’s investment in AES Wind Generation. The final execution of the terms in the letter of intent would be subject to additional due diligence, completion of final documentation and regulatory approval."
read more: China Investment Corporation - Press Release
read more: AES - Press Release
11/6/2009
Source: Korean Ministry of Strategy and Finance
According to Nasdaq, "South Korea's sovereign wealth fund, Korea Investment Corporation, has signed a cooperation agreement with the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, the finance ministry said Friday. The two sovereign wealth funds will provide each other with advisory services and other assistance when they seek overseas investments, the Ministry of Strategy and Finance said in a statement. The agreement follows non-deal road shows in Dubai and Abu Dhabi early this week by a South Korean delegation led by a vice finance minister.
Korean officials updated top executives from the region on the East Asian economy, investments in infrastructure projects and regulatory changes on the issuance of Islamic bonds in Korea, it said. The Korean government is aiming to attract capital from Islamic markets to diversify overseas debt sources and spread risk. "
read more: Nasdaq
11/5/2009
According to Nasdaq, "President Barack Obama's choice to serve as the Treasury Department's assistant secretary for international markets and development pledged support for rigorous scrutiny of U.S. investments by sovereign wealth funds.
"Sovereign wealth funds are not just a private sector investor, but rather are arms of government," and need to be subject to stricter scrutiny than other foreign investors interested in U.S. assets, said Marisa Lago, Obama's choice for the Treasury Department job.
Lago's comments came Thursday at a Senate Banking Committee hearing on her nomination. She told lawmakers that her years as head of the international office at the Securities and Exchange Commission were good preparation for the Treasury position, which coordinates the work of the interagency Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S., or Cfius. Cfius members review proposed mergers, acquisitions and investments in the U.S. by foreigners, including foreign governments, and can scuttle such deals based on national security concerns. During the Bush administration, the panel cleared Dubai Ports World's plan to acquire leases to manage U.S. ports, a deal that was later blocked by Congress."
read more: Nasdaq
11/2/2009
The following questions are answered by Adrian Orr, CEO of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund:
Question 1: How does the New Zealand Superannuation Fund view the future of transparency, are there any common beliefs among the leadership as to whether or not the current state of transparency standards are adequate, or if more needs to be done?
The future of transparency
In the view of the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation (‘the Guardians’, ‘we’, ‘our’) the Global Financial Crisis is just the latest example of how perceived or actual opacity can damage the reputation of financial institutions. This in turn damages the perceived domestic and international legitimacy of these institutions, and ultimately their ability to operate.
We believe that an important step toward establishing and then preserving legitimacy is for a financial institution to make it easy for its stakeholders to understand why it exists, what it does, and how. The Guardians have taken a broad view of who our stakeholders are, because our impacts are broad and criticism can come from many quarters and can very rapidly become a material operational issue.
This is a reality already being faced by SWFs and we believe it will become more acute, for a number of reasons.
1. As a consequence of SWFs’ increasing impact
As SWFs get bigger their individual and collective impacts will increase on domestic and international capital markets, real economies and people’s lives in general. This creates and enhances political, media and general public scrutiny.
2. As a consequence of change within SWFs’ broad system of potential counterparties
Co investors, investment managers, regulators, governments and other counterparties will all be responding to their own changing transparency requirements e.g. through changing electoral demands; new or tougher official information legislation; through becoming signatories to the UN-PRI or other transparency/principle-driven structures. This means that an increasing number of investment opportunities will come with potentially multiple levels of transparency requirements ‘baked in’.
3. As a consequence of SWFs’ purpose
Many SWFs have intergenerational purposes e.g. pension prefunding. As these purposes move from conceptual to tangible (in the Superfund’s case from 2031), more scrutiny will be applied out of self-interest as to how successfully (or otherwise) an SWF is fulfilling that purpose.
Current transparency standards
For each SWF these are a function of a combination of;
Compliance (including with any SWF-specific establishing legislation); and
The SWF’s assessment of how much additional transparency is prudent for its commercial operations and home jurisdiction.
The Santiago Principles are a proactive recognition that a certain level of transparency is both necessary and desirable: in the first instance, in anticipation of regulatory barriers to SWF investment which may be erected as a result of perceived SWF opacity.
Question 2: What factors of transparency are of high importance to the New Zealand Superannuation Fund? We currently list about 10 principles that we feel the average person would be interested in, can you tell us what the public needs to know?
Factors of transparency of high importance to the Guardians of New Zealand Superannuation
For us transparency is important around three main areas:
Why we exist – what outcome is it that the NZ Government and Guardians are seeking from the New Zealand Superannuation Fund and what parameters (e.g. principles, standards and procedures) have been established around the pursuit of that outcome? Crucially also, what is the timeline for achieving it?
What we do – what are our beliefs about investment, what are the underpinnings of those beliefs, what strategies have we in place to deliver on our beliefs and what are our organisational capabilities to successfully execute the strategies? How do we structure our investment portfolio for our long-term purpose and how do we manage the trade-off between our expected returns and risk? What are we invested in and why? How do we select investment managers?
How we are performing – what is our performance relative to our expectations and within that performance what value are we adding relative to the returns the New Zealand Government could have generated by doing nothing, relative to the Guardians being a smaller, simpler organization and relative to another organization with a comparable portfolio managing the Fund instead of the Guardians? How are we performing against the non-financial aspects of our mandate and what specific examples of this can we point toward?
Relative to the Linaburg-Maduell Transparency Index
The categories in the index are logical but as SWFs mature and as the transparency demands of them also mature (crucially, not necessarily at the same pace), we believe focus logically will go on two areas which collectively best demonstrate how the SWF behaves.
1. What investment beliefs does the SWF hold and what are the strategies and capabilities it has to deliver on them; and
2. What proof points does it provide of investment activity which is consistent with those beliefs i.e. case studies?
Linaburg-Maduell Transparency Index
10/29/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Qatar may join General Electric Co. and CVC Capital Partners Ltd. in their bid to buy Areva SA’s electricity transmission and distribution unit, two people familiar with the matter said.
Qatar Holding LLC, an investment unit of the Persian Gulf country’s sovereign wealth fund, hired New York-based investment bank Evercore Partners Inc. to advise on acquiring a stake in Areva’s unit should the GE-led bid succeed, said the people, who declined to be named because the talks are private. Officials at Doha-based Qatar Holding declined to comment.
Areva, the world’s largest maker of nuclear reactors, received three indicative bids worth less than 4 billion euros ($5.9 billion) for the unit, people close to the sale said last month. The French government, owner of 92 percent of Areva, may decide the division should be sold to a group formed by Alstom SA, the unit’s previous owner, and Schneider Electric SA, to preserve France’s economic interests, analysts have said. Toshiba Corp. also submitted an offer, the people said.
GE Energy spokesman Dan Nelson declined to comment. Officials at Evercore weren’t available to comment."
read more: Bloomberg
10/29/2009
According to the WSJ, "China Investment Corporation has reached a deal to invest up to $700 million in Mongolia-focused Iron Mining International Ltd., the latest move by the sovereign wealth fund to plow cash into commodities.
CIC is rapidly deploying its capital this year to try to catch the upside of a global economic recovery by buying into natural resources and property assets. On Wednesday, CIC Chairman Lou Jiwei told a forum that CIC has allocated $110 billion for overseas investments and deployed around half. Commodities have been a major focus of the fund's investing strategy and asset allocation, he said.
Originally, CIC was expected to allocate only about a third of its initial $200 billion in capital, or just $67 billion, for overseas investments. Mr. Lou's comments indicate that CIC has pumped around $40 billion of its cash hoard into other assets this year after having invested a total of $13.52 billion by the end of 2008, according to data from CIC's annual report. The terms of CIC's investment in Iron Mining International involve a $500 million convertible loan, with an option for the company to increase the loan to $700 million, according to people familiar with the situation. The company, formerly known as Hong Kong Lung Ming Investment Holdings Ltd., is planning to raise $1 billion through an initial public offering in Hong Kong during the second quarter of next year, one person said. CIC's investment is structured so that the loan will become ordinary shares at the time of Iron Mining International's IPO at a discount to the IPO price, the person said."
read more: WSJ
10/26/2009
According to the Press Release, "Alexander Molyneux, President and CEO of SouthGobi Energy Resources Ltd., announced today that SouthGobi will accelerate the development of its Mongolian coal projects through its wholly-owned Mongolian operating subsidiary, Southgobi sands LLC. SouthGobi’s Mongolian investment program during the next three to five years is planned to include:
Expansion of the Ovoot Tolgoi Mine.
Development of the Soumber deposit.
Development of regional transportation infrastructure.
Construction of a coal washing facility.
Creation of approximately 300 new jobs.
Mr. Molyneux said financing for the investment program has been secured from a wholly-owned subsidiary of China Investment Corporation (”CIC”), which will provide US$500 million in the form of a secured, convertible debenture bearing interest at 8.0%.
'Our continued exploration successes have significantly expanded our coal resources in Mongolia’s South Gobi – and now we are in a position to develop our company into a prominent regional producer and exporter,' Mr. Molyneux added.
'We recently announced our Measured and Indicated coal resource base, compliant with the Canadian NI 43-101 reporting standard, has increased from 221.2 million tonnes to 307.6 million tonnes, a jump of 39%. We also announced the initial resource at Soumber, an entirely new coal deposit in the South Gobi, and there is significant potential for other discoveries.'"
read more: Press Release
10/26/2009
Australia’s sovereign wealth fund will be investigated by the nation’s regulator over the sale of Telstra Corp. shares less than a month before a government threat to split the company, said Senator Steve Fielding. The Future Fund said it didn’t have access to private information.
The Australian Securities & Investments Commission will investigate whether the Future Fund was “tipped off” on the proposed separation of the country’s former phone monopoly, Fielding said in an e-mailed statement today.
The Future Fund, whose assets were worth A$64 billion ($59 billion) at Sept. 30, sold A$2.37 billion of Telstra shares on Aug. 20 under what it called a previously stated strategy of reducing its stake. On Sept. 15, the government said Telstra must separate its fixed-line assets from its consumer business or face curbs on mobile-services expansion.
read more: Bloomberg
10/23/2009
According to Reuters, "France's FSI strategic investment fund will take part in a 17 million euros ($25 million) capital raising for web video share site Dailymotion, the Gallic rival of Google Inc's YouTube. The money raised will be used to accelerate Dailymotion's expansion, notably abroad, the FSI said in a statement on Thursday.
'We are one of the rare French players that can participate in the future (sector) consolidation,' Dailymotion Chief Executive Cedric Tournay told Reuters.
The FSI will invest 7.5 million euros in the transaction, alongside Dailymotion's existing shareholders Advent Venture Partners, AGF Private Equity, Atlas Venture et Partech International. Dailymotion, which says it has 60 million unique visitors worldwide, also aimed to post a profit next year, having reached breakeven, Tournay said. The company had no plans to seek a stock market listing in the short term. "We will consider it within two to three years," said Tournay."
read more: Reuters
read more: Official French Press Release
10/22/2009
According to the Business 24-7, "Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) is investing in two towers in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, who is on a visit to the South American nation, inspected the construction progress of the towers. Earlier in Brasilia, Sheikh Abdullah held talks with Minister of External Relations of Brazil Celso Amorim and discussed means of enhancing co-operation in areas of economy, trade and investment between the two nations. The UAE side called for concluding bilateral agreements on avoidance of double taxation and encouragement and protection of investment.
Arrangements for the upcoming visit of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai, to Brazil next year were also discussed. The two sides also examined the role of private sector in boosting bilateral co-operation.
Stressing the importance of the Brazilian consumer market, Sheikh Abdullah said: 'The UAE aspires to push economic co-operation ahead and is ready to extend all possible assistance to Brazilian companies operating in sectors such as tourism, trade, renewable energy and real estate and encourage them to invest in the UAE market.'
'The UAE will continue with its open-door policy to attract more foreign investments.'"
read more: Business 24-7
10/22/2009
According to the National, "Mubadala Development, the investment arm of the Abu Dhabi government, will grow its assets threefold over the next five years, the company’s chief operating officer said today. The firm lost Dh11.8bn (US$3.21bn) last year due to write-downs on investments triggered by falling oil prices and the global financial crisis. Mubadala, which released its first annual report last week, has said it would continue to make acquisitions, borrow from banks and draw as much as Dh21bn from the Abu Dhabi Government this year.
'Over the next five years, given the existing portfolio of projects that we have, you will see that the asset base of Mubadala is likely to to grow from the Dh54bn that you see today to a number at least three times that,' said Waleed al Muhairi at the UAE Global Investment Forum in Abu Dhabi.
Mubadala is planning to issue a bond and has recently engaged in a roadshow with potential investors in Europe and the US. The bond will be part of a larger medium-term programme."
read more: The National
10/20/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Qatar made 615 million pounds ($1 billion) by selling shares in Barclays Plc a year after it helped bail out Britain’s second-biggest bank.
Qatar Holding LLC, an arm of the Doha-based Qatar Investment Authority, sold more than 379 million Barclays shares at 360 pence each, sale manager Credit Suisse AG said today in a statement. The firm acquired the shares by exercising warrants at 197.775 pence. Barclays fell as much as 5.6 percent.
Barclays raised more than 5 billion pounds from Middle Eastern investors last year, triggering criticism from shareholders including Legal & General Group Plc who weren’t first given an opportunity to buy new stock. Barclays has surged since touching a March low, as it avoided government aid unlike Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc and Lloyds Banking Group Plc. "
read more: Bloomberg
10/19/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Temasek Holdings Pte, Singapore’s government-owned investment company, hired Deutsche Bank AG, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley to help it sell 10-year bonds in U.S. dollars.
The sale will be benchmark, Temasek said in a stock market filing today, without being more specific about the size. Benchmark typically means at least $500 million.
'We’re not expecting any major acquisitions but obviously that’s what this company is all about,' Standard & Poor’s credit analyst Manuel Guerena said in a phone interview from Singapore. 'These bonds will help extend Temasek’s debt maturity profile, and I guess it’s a bit of a signal to the market that the volatility in equity markets over the past year or so hasn’t affected Temasek’s financial rating.'"
read more: Bloomberg
10/15/2009
According to the China Investment Corporation, "CIC has completed the settlement for its Phase I investment in 45% of the equity in Nobel Oil Group ("Nobel") based in Russia. HongKong’s Oriental Patron has acquired 5% equity stake. The original Russian shareholders maintain their 50% stake. CIC has agreed to invest US$ 300 million in aggregation in this transaction. The US$ 150 million in Phase I investment includes $ 100 million for the purchase of equity stake from Russian shareholders and $ 50 million for Nobel's operating expenses. In Phase II, the remaining US$ 150million is to be used within 9 months for acquiring and developing oil reserve assets (approximately 150 million barrels) in close proximity to Nobel's existing oilfields."
read more: CIC
10/14/2009
According to the press release, "An investor consortium comprising affiliates of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. L.P. (KKR), GIC Special Investments Pte. Ltd. (GIC SI) and China International Capital Corporation Limited (CICC) announced an investment of $160 million for a significant minority stake in International Far Eastern Leasing Company Ltd. (Far Eastern), the leading provider of financial leasing in China and a subsidiary of Sinochem Group (Sinochem). The investment will support Far Eastern’s future growth as it moves to capitalize on the attractive potential in the underdeveloped financial leasing space in China. Sinochem is retaining a controlling stake in Far Eastern.
'We are very excited to have world-class investors, comprising KKR as the lead investor, together with GIC SI and CICC, as long-term partners in Far Eastern’s development,' said Mr. Kong Fanxing, Chief Executive Officer of Far Eastern. “In addition to capital, their experience investing in and growing financial services businesses globally brings tremendous value to Far Eastern and will enable us to further develop our ability to provide integrated and innovative business services around our core business of financial leasing. This investment will also help support the Shanghai government’s long term goal to develop the city into a global financial and shipping center.'
Headquartered in Shanghai, Far Eastern is focused on providing innovative and industry-tailored financing solutions for its clients. The company targets sectors with stable cash flow and sustainable growth potential, including those in the medical, printing, education, infrastructure construction, shipping, machine tool sectors, etc.
'We are delighted to have the opportunity to invest in Far Eastern, the market leader in the financial leasing industry in China. We have been extremely impressed with the company's strong track record, outstanding management team, deep customer relationships and a very supportive shareholder, Sinochem.” David Liu, Member of KKR and Head of KKR Greater China, said. “We look forward to fully utilizing our financial services industry expertise and global network to support the company as it continues to grow and develop into a world-class financial institution.'
'We are pleased to become a partner of Far Eastern Leasing and Sinochem. As a global investor, GIC SI has a long-term investment interest in China,” Liu Dong, Head of GIC SI Greater China said. “We have extensive investment experience in China's financial services industry and state owned enterprises. We would share our experience with Far Eastern and Sinochem and help accelerate the development of their businesses.'
'We are excited to have the opportunity to invest in a high-growth enterprise like Far Eastern led by a superb management team,” said Ms. Shirley Chen, Managing Director and Head of Private Equity of CICC. “We hope our expertise in capital markets and our understanding of China’s financial services industry and the development of its state owned enterprises, coupled with our network in China, will be helpful for Far Eastern’s future development.'"
read more: KKR Press Release
10/14/2009
According to USA Today, "Libyan Arab Foreign Investment Company representative Khaled Fareg Zentuti has been nominated for a seat on Juventus' board of directors.
LAFICO owns a 7.5 percent stake in Juventus, which is publicly traded, and had a seat on the board until 2003 when Al Saadi Gadhafi, the son of the Libyan leader, withdrew to play for Serie A rival Perugia.
LAFICO has the second biggest stake in Juventus, with the Agnelli family's holding company EXOR SpA retaining a majority 60 percent. Zentuti is expected to join the board at the next assembly on Oct. 27."
read more: USA Today
10/12/2009
The Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute – Consensus Demand Meter is an innovative indicator to track what sovereign wealth funds are demanding in the next three quarters from that relative start date. For Q3 Y2009 (End of September 2009) going forward three months, this Demand Meter indicates how select asset allocations, sectors, and investment strategies rank.
A score of 10, indicates that this area is attractive for the majority or large portion of SWFs. A score of 1, means that SWFs will most likely try to lower exposure from that sector, allocation or strategy. There are many diverse types of sovereign wealth funds with differing objectives, priorities, and goals. This is purely a consensus indicator derived from our Institute's research and analysis. Not all strategies, asset allocations, and sectors are included in this indicator.
Our data is gathered through various sources:
Internal sources
Public announcements
Executive investment professionals
Market & economic research
10/12/2009
According to the AP, "Oil exporters in the Middle East and North Africa region are expected to increase their international reserves by over 100 billion dollars in 2010 as oil prices rebound, the IMF said on Sunday. The rebuilding of reserves will help governments of the region maintain public spending, which has mitigated the impact of the global financial turmoil on their economies, the International Monetary Fund said in report released in Dubai.
'With higher oil prices and the anticipated re-emergence of global demand, oil revenues are expected to increase, allowing oil exporters to rebuild their international reserve positions by over 100 billion dollars in 2010,' the Middle East and Central Asia Regional Economic Outlook said.
Oil exporters -- Algeria, Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, United Arab Emirates and Yemen -- have suffered as oil prices dropped to near 30 dollars per barrel around the turn of the year from an all-time high of 147 dollars per barrel in July 2008.
As a result, the current account surplus of these countries dropped by nearly 350 billion dollars. Since then, the price of oil has rebounded to around 70 dollars per barrel.
'The use of reserve buffers for countercyclical spending by oil exporters mitigated the impact on their own economies and generated positive spillovers for their neighbours,' IMF Middle East and Central Asia department director Masood Ahmed said in a press release."
read more: AP
10/9/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Norway’s $445 billion oil fund demanded that Volkswagen AG, Europe’s largest automaker, cancel its merger with Porsche SE, saying the deal favors the German sports-car manufacturer’s family owners.
The proposed transactions are unacceptable as they “leave the impression of being designed to suit the needs of the Porsche controlling families,” Norges Bank Investment Management, which manages the fund, wrote in a letter dated yesterday to Volkswagen supervisory board Chairman Ferdinand Piech and board members.
The fund, which invests Norway’s oil and gas revenue in stocks and bonds outside of the country, said it’s weighing unspecified options if VW doesn’t reconsider the deal, which was agreed upon after months of negotiations. The German state of Lower Saxony, VW’s second-largest shareholder with a 20 percent stake and veto rights, has signed off on the August agreement between the two German carmakers. "
read more: Bloomberg
10/5/2009
According to the Press Release, "Khazanah Nasional Berhad (“Khazanah”) is pleased to announce that it has committed to invest USD150 million (RM525 million) to acquire a 25% stake in Fajr Capital Limited (“Fajr Capital”), a Dubai-based Islamic investment firm. The acquisition was completed with the conclusion of Fajr Capital’s first round of funding with commitments amounting USD588 million (RM2.058 billion) which has brought together prominent shareholders from key Muslim markets, which includes strategic investors Khazanah and a private firm MASIC (a member of Al-Subeaei Group of Saudi Arabia) and other investors, including the sovereign investment agencies, Brunei Investment Agency and Abu Dhabi Investment Council.
Fajr Capital focuses on providing Shari’ah-compliant financial services and complementary opportunities in the broader economy in major Muslim regions.
According to Khazanah’s Managing Director, Tan Sri Dato’ Azman Hj. Mokhtar, the Government investment arm’s venture into Fajr Capital aims to provide cross linkages between Malaysia and key Muslim markets, laying the foundation for a stronger economic cooperation as well as supporting the aspirations of Malaysian International Islamic Financial Centre (“MIFC”)."
read more: Press Release
10/5/2009
G.I.C., a sovereign wealth fund of Singapore, said Tuesday that its investments fell more than 20 percent in the year that ended in March, but recovered more than half that loss during the rally on financial markets since then.G.L.C., or the Government of Singapore Investment Corp., the larger of the city-state’s two wealth funds, said it had increased exposure to alternative investments like real estate and natural resources but was bearish on bonds. The fund said its managers were optimistic about emerging markets and Asia.
The fund’s portfolio shrank by more than a fifth in the year that ended March 31, but it has ridden the financial meltdown better than its sister fund Temasek by paring its exposure to equities before the crisis and through a well-timed sale of part of its Citigroup holding. G.I.C., headed by Lee Kuan Yew, the former prime minister, is the largest sovereign fund in the world after those of Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia and Norway, according to Deutsche Bank. The fund says it manages more than $100 billion; analysts estimate the figure at $200 billion to $300 billion.
read more: The New York Times
10/1/2009
According to the Press Release, "Olam International Limited (“Olam” or the “Company”), a leading global, integrated supply chain manager of agricultural products and food ingredients, today announced that after the successful launch of Convertible Bonds to raise US$400 million on 2 September 2009, it has increased the issue size of its recently launched 6.00 per cent. convertible bonds due 2016 by an additional US$100 million, bringing the total issue size to US$500 million.
Olam had previously granted the Joint Lead Managers an upsize option for the issue of up to an additional US$100 million in principal amount of convertible bonds (“Upsize Option”).
The Joint Lead Managers have today exercised the option for the full US$100 million. The exercise of the Upsize Option will provide Olam with additional funds to realize the Company’s recently announced six year strategy, and further term out its debt profile. The entire US$100 million in convertible bonds, pursuant to the Upsize Option, will be placed by the Joint Lead Managers (“Placement”) to Breedens Investments Pte Ltd (“Breedens”), a substantial shareholder of Olam and an indirect wholly-owned subsidiary of Temasek Holdings (Pte) Ltd, which marks its second investment in Olam in the last three months."
read more: Olam Press Release
9/30/2009
According to Bloomberg, "China’s sovereign wealth fund bought a stake in the London-traded unit of Kazakhstan’s state-run energy company, taking its spending on resources to at least $3.69 billion this month.
China Investment Corp., which holds almost $300 billion, bought an 11 percent stake in Astana, Kazakhstan-based JSC KazMunaiGas Exploration Production for about $939 million by purchasing global depositary receipts, according to a statement dated today on the Beijing-based fund’s Web site.
China is hunting for resources from Canada to Nigeria to support expansion in the world’s fastest-growing major economy. Today’s deal follows a combined $2.75 billion spent by the fund on Indonesia’s PT Bumi Resources and Noble Group Ltd. last week.
'The reason why China is investing in assets like this is simple: it needs more oil and gas,' said Shi Yan, an analyst at UOB-Kay Hian Ltd. in Shanghai. 'China also has huge financial reserves and with commodity prices still down from highs last year, it’s still a good time to buy.'"
read more: Bloomberg
9/30/2009
According to Bloomberg, "Qatar wants to increase its stake in Volkswagen AG after the German carmaker completes its takeover of Porsche SE, an executive at the emirate’s investment agency board said.
'If they give me the opportunity, I will,' Hussain Al- Abdulla, a Qatar Investment Authority board member, said today in an interview at the Doha Business Roundtable, when asked whether the emirate plans to expand its holding after the German manufacturers combine.
Volkswagen, Europe’s biggest automaker, rose to a 12-day high in Frankfurt trading. Qatar already has 10 percent of the voting rights in Porsche, the maker of the 911 sports car, and options that will give the Persian Gulf state 17 percent of Wolfsburg-based Volkswagen as part of the carmakers’ merger agreement last month.
'The holding may eventually reach about 20 percent, but I can’t imagine they’d seek anything larger,' said Tim Schuldt, an analyst at Equinet AG with a “sell” recommendation on VW stock. 'What matters is that Volkswagen is in safe hands, with a clear shareholder structure.' "
read more: Bloomberg
9/29/2009
According to the report, "In recent years, GIC had sought to construct a diversified multi-asset class portfolio by increasing alternative
investments such as private equity and real estate. However, this diversification was ineffective in the financial earthquake that occurred last year. The portfolio suffered a loss of more than 20% in Singapore dollar terms in the financial year to 31 March 2009. This loss pulled down the 20-year nominal annual rate of return in Singapore dollar terms from 5.8% to 4.4%. The real rate of return, in excess of global inflation, fell from 4.5% to 2.6%. In US dollar terms, the 20-year nominal annual rate of return was 5.7% as at 31 March 2009."
read more: GIC Report
9/28/2009
The Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute – Consensus Demand Meter is an innovative indicator to track what sovereign wealth funds are demanding in the next three quarters from that relative start date. For Q2 Y2009 (End of June 2009) going forward three months, this Demand Meter indicates how select asset allocations, sectors, and investment strategies rank.
A score of 10, indicates that this area is attractive for the majority or large portion of SWFs. A score of 1, means that SWFs will most likely try to lower exposure from that sector, allocation or strategy. There are many diverse types of sovereign wealth funds with differing objectives, priorities, and goals. This is purely a consensus indicator derived from our Institute's research and analysis. Not all strategies, asset allocations, and sectors are included in this indicator.
Our data is gathered through various sources:
Internal sources
Public announcements
Executive investment professionals
Market & economic research
The Q3 Y2009 Meter is previewed in the next Sovereign Wealth Quarterly and Asset Allocation 2009 report.
For more information, please visit our contact page.
9/23/2009
By purchasing this publication, you will gain insight and intelligence on current sovereign wealth fund asset allocation. Sovereign Wealth Fund Asset Allocation 2009 is a comprehensive publication that includes up to date statistics, information, commentary, and analysis on sovereign wealth fund asset allocation. Maintaining intelligence on sovereign wealth fund asset allocation is essential for all fund managers, firms seeking capital, investment advisors, institutional real estate professionals, institutional investors, placement agents, law firms, consultants and other investment professionals.
Our dedicated team of research analysts has contacted funds, governments, fund managers, and other industry professionals from around the world. We do this to ensure the information held in this year's publication is comprehensive, relevant, and up to date.
|
Some topics covered include:
2008 & 2009 Asset Allocations of many SWFs
Expert Commentaries
Investment Trend Analysis
Investment Holdings Analysis
Future Asset Allocation Strategies
Much more
All current Sovereign Wealth Quarterly Subscribers will earn a 10% rebate (US$ 75)back from the purchase price. This rebate will be mailed out upon purchase.
View Sample Pages
Available to ship on 9/28/2009
read more: Order Now
|
9/23/2009
According to the press release, "PT Bumi Resources Tbk (“Bumi”) announced that China Investment Corporation (“CIC”) has invested US$1.9 billion in Bumi in the form of a debt-like instrument. The US$1.9 billion investment consists of US$600 million repayable in year 4, US$600 million in year 5, and remaining US$700 million in year 6. The investment attracts a 12% annual cash coupon with a total IRR of 19%, the balance payable at the time of final maturities. The funds will be used for debt restructuring and capital expenditure.
'We are honored by this historic and transformational investment by CIC, the leading sovereign fund in the world. The investment will enable Bumi to implement its growth strategies quickly and provide a stable capital structure. More importantly, the partnership creates the platform for CIC and Bumi to pursue investment opportunities jointly', remarked Ari Hudaya, President Director and CEO of Bumi, one of the leading natural resources companies in Asia with world-class coal assets. CIC, wholly-owned by the People’s Republic of China, is one of the largest and reputable investment institutions in the world. Bumi is Indonesia's largest producer and one of the world’s largest exporter of thermal coal with strong practices in community development, corporate social responsibility and corporate governance.
PT Samuel Sekuritas Indonesia acted as arranger and financial advisor, and Jones Day acted as legal advisor to Bumi. Deutsche Bank and China International Capital Corporation (CICC) acted as financial advisors and Davis Polk & Wardwell acted as legal advisor to CIC in this transaction."
read more: Press Release
9/23/2009
According to the Wall Street Journal, "the Inter-American Development Bank is in talks with China Investment Corp. on a US$1 billion arrangement for trade promotion co-financing, Jean-Marc Aboussouan, chief of the multi-lateral lender's infrastructure division, said Wednesday.
'Talks are going well,' Aboussouan added.
Earlier, Steven Puig, vice president for the private sector and non-sovereign guaranteed operations of the Washington-based IDB, said the IDB was poised to announce the arrangement with a Chinese agency. CIC is China's $300 billion sovereign wealth fund. The IDB is the largest source of multilateral financing for Latin America and the Caribbean."
read more: Wall Street Journal
9/21/2009
Press Release states, "The Noble Group (SGX: NOBL) is pleased to announce today an agreement to place 573,000,000 number of shares, for a total consideration of approximately USD 850,000,000 to China Investment Corporation (“CIC”) at a price of SGD2.1137 per share. The placement comprised of 438,000,000 newly issued shares by the Company and 135,000,000 shares from trusts associated with the interests of Noble founder and CEO Richard Elman. The placement is subject to approval of the respective boards of directors of Noble Group and CIC and final legal documentation.
The placement was the result of extensive discussions between the two parties and underscores the expertise the Noble Group has developed in supply chain management and the distribution of commodities, particularly agricultural products. Noble’s diverse agricultural activities include farm production in Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil which is linked to an internal logistic and storage capability. Access to export markets is further supported by 5 owned port facilities throughout South America. Noble’s other agricultural assets include crushing plants and sugar refineries.
The newly issued shares will provide the Noble Group with additional capital to pursue strategic investments in key agricultural markets globally.
The shares sold by interests associated with Mr. Elman represent a small fraction of his holdings in the Noble Group and are only the second such sale by Mr. Elman since he founded the Group. It is the intention of Mr. Elman to use some of the proceeds associated with the sale of his interests in Noble to fund a charitable foundation with a focus on fostering international relations amongst Asian nations. The sale by Mr. Elman in no way reduces Mr. Elman’s commitment to Noble Group, the company which he founded and continues to be involved in day to day management.
CIC and Noble have agreed to enter into this partnership for the purpose of jointly investing in infrastructure assets and supply chain management related to agricultural commodities. It is the intention of both companies to bring to bear their respective strengths to achieve results which are satisfactory to their respective shareholders and bring benefits to consumers of agricultural products worldwide.
Mr. Elman commented “We are all extremely pleased with the investment by CIC in Noble and heartened that they, like us, evaluate the evolution and success of a company over decades as opposed to merely fiscal quarters. We think the opportunities to work together over the coming decades will be tremendous and we look forward to working together.”
Merrill Lynch (Singapore) Pte. Limited acted as the sole placement agent for Noble Group. J.P. Morgan Securities (Asia Pacific) Limited acted as financial advisor to CIC."
read more: Press Release: The Noble Group
9/19/2009
Gulf Times reports, "Qatar Holding, a strategic and direct investment arm of Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), will extend debt finance to part fund Songbird Estates’ purchase of additional 8.45% equity in the London’s realty developer Canary Wharf Group (CWG). Songbird Estates, in which the Qatar Holding seeks to be one of the largest shareholders, has invested £112.5mn in buying another 54mn shares in CWG, a leading real estate and development company with more than 7mn square feet of office and retail space. The purchase of additional stake will increase the share of Songbird, which is incorporated in England and Wales, in the CWG to 69.3% from 60.8%.
'Qatar Holding will be a leading participant in a new debt facility to help fund the purchase by Songbird Estates of the additional shares in CWG,' said a spokesman of Qatar Holding, which has agreed to fully participate in the offering to the extent of its 14.8% stake in Songbird.
However, he did not disclose to what extent Qatar Holding will partake in the debt facility. The CWG is an integrated property development and investment entity focused exclusively on Grade-A office space and high retail facilities at the Canary Wharf Estate, a 97-acre development which is part of the Central London Office Market.
'We fully support the management of Songbird in undertaking this transaction, which we believe is a good opportunity to create value for all Songbird shareholders,' said Ahmad al-Sayed, CEO of Qatar Holding, which will also be the lead participant in the previously announced £275mn preference share issue."
read more: Gulf Times
9/18/2009
The press release states, "Verenex Energy Inc. ("Verenex")and the Libyan Investment Authority (the "LIA") jointly announced today they have entered into a binding memorandum of understanding ("MOU") respecting the sale of all of the issued and outstanding shares of Verenex (on a fully-diluted basis) to the LIA at a price of $7.09 per share in cash. The MOU provides that Verenex shall distribute out to its shareholders any positive working capital at the time of closing, which Verenex currently estimates will be a nominal amount and subject to a number of factors which are primarily the rate of ongoing expenditures by Verenex and the period of time for completion of the transaction.
The LIA is a sovereign wealth fund established in 2006 by the General People's Committee of Libya (the "GPC") to manage Libya's surplus oil revenues. In commenting on the transaction, Mohamed Layas, Executive Director of the LIA, stated "the Libyan Investment Authority has assets of over US$65 billion and is pleased to add the Verenex business to its oil and gas portfolio".
The MOU contemplates that a definitive agreement will be signed on or before October 20, 2009, and that the LIA will escrow funds or establish an irrevocable letter of credit or bank guarantee arrangement for the purchase of Verenex at the time the definitive agreement is signed. The MOU provides that the transaction is conditional on completion by the LIA, prior to signing a definitive agreement, its due diligence review of Verenex, finalization of a definitive agreement and receipt of all requisite regulatory, court and shareholder approvals. The LIA has represented in the MOU that the transaction has received all necessary Libyan government approvals. The MOU will be filed on SEDAR at www.sedar.com. Verenex expects the transaction will be completed by way of a plan of arrangement.
The Verenex Board of Directors, after consulting with its financial and legal advisors, has unanimously determined that the proposed transaction represents the best alternative reasonably available to Verenex and its shareholders and, in light of such available alternatives, is in the best interests of Verenex and the Verenex shareholders. The Board has therefore authorized and approved the MOU. Verenex has agreed to use its best endeavours to secure the agreement of its directors and officers and of its major shareholder, Vermilion Resources Ltd. (representing in aggregate approximately 45% of the outstanding common shares on a fully diluted basis), to support and vote in favour of the proposed transaction.
Commenting on the transaction, James D. McFarland, President and Chief Executive Officer of Verenex stated "the Libyan Investment Authority is a highly respected Libyan institution with a solid track record of doing deals. Our focus has always been on doing the best for our shareholders and the Board of Verenex unanimously endorses this deal as in the best interests of Verenex shareholders."
read more: Verenex Press Release
9/16/2009
According to the Reuters, "Leading sovereign funds formed the International Working Group of Sovereign Wealth Funds in 2008, announcing a set of 24 principles and best practices, known as the Santiago Principles, last October. The group -- whose members include the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Singapore, China, Korea, Russia and Norway -- meets once a year to exchange views on issues of common interest and the next gathering is due in October in Baku, Azerbaijan. Gary Smith, head of central bank, supranational and SWF business at BNP Paribas Investment Partners, warns that an excessive push for transparency, coupled with recent poor performance, could lower the risk appetite of SWFs and encourage them to favor safer instruments such as bonds.
'Following the whole push toward transparency, funds opened themselves up for a monitoring process which did not exist,' Smith said.
'We have transparency problems for them. The consequences are that these guys are being marked to market on a daily basis by domestic constituents. It's uncomfortable, particularly when the assets under management shrink.'
Sponsoring governments therefore need to spell out the mandate of their SWFs with a clearer investment horizon -- thereby allowing them to ride out short-term portfolio fluctuations and protecting them from domestic criticism.
'Obviously we believe transparency is a good thing. The problem of transparency is -- daily performance, daily this, daily that -- that we create an obsession which often detracts from what you are trying to achieve from a particular portfolio,' said John Green, global head of business development at Investec.
'There should be governance structures, transparency, disclosure but you don't want to drive the investment strategies through public opinion," said Green, whose clients include African official institutions.'"
read more: Reuters
9/15/2009
According to the Press Release, "Agreement with the Libyan Investment Authority to acquire up to 11.8 million shares as part of the capital increase Wienerberger has entered into an agreement with the Libyan Investment Authority (“LIA”), an investment fund of the Libyan state, pursuant to which LIA has committed to acquire, as part of the capital increase, up to 11.8 million shares of Wienerberger (representing up to 10 % of the outstanding shares after the capital increase) at the subscription price. LIA may acquire the new shares by means of subscription rights acquired in the rights offering or in the placement of new shares for which subscription rights are not exercised in the rights offering. LIA is a long-term investor and holds interests in a variety of international industrial enterprises. LIA has agreed not to sell, within a period of one year, any shares acquired in the capital increase provided its participation in Wienerberger after the capital increase reaches at least 5%. In addition, it was agreed that LIA shall, without the consent of Wienerberger, not acquire more than 15% in Wienerberger's share capital for a two year period."
read more: Wienerberger AG
9/14/2009
Wall Street Journal reports, "The Chinese government's investment arm is in talks on taking a minority stake in Virginia-based power-plant developer AES Corp., according to people familiar with the matter. The possible purchase is part of a wide-ranging discussion aimed at building an alliance between AES and China Investment Corp., the country's sovereign wealth fund, with some $300 billion in assets.
The discussions could result in CIC taking a significant stake in AES, which has a market capitalization of about $9.5 billion. A joint venture between the two parties also is under discussion, in which CIC would contribute capital to AES's plans to develop power plants around the globe, said the people familiar with the matter. These people described the talks as being at a sensitive stage, and said they might not produce a deal.
An AES spokeswoman declined to comment. A spokeswoman for CIC also declined to comment."
read more: Wall Street Journal
9/13/2009
Reuters reports, "France's FSI strategic investment fund could buy stakes in assets that French nuclear reactor supplier Areva is selling, the fund's head told Les Echos newspaper.
Asked about Areva's power Transmission & Distribution (T&D) unit and its minority stakes in mining group Eramet and chipmaker STMicroelectronics, Gilles Michel said, 'Regarding Eramet, the FSI is obviously one of the possible shareholders, but there are other players. It's exactly the same answer for STMicroelectronics and for T&D.'
On Wednesday, the FSI raised its stake in Technip, a builder of refineries and pipelines, to 5 percent from 2.6 percent. Michel told Les Echos the FSI spent 90 million euros $130.5 million on the Technip investment."
read more: Reuters
9/11/2009
Bloomberg reports, "The Mongolian government will set up a sovereign wealth fund using mining royalties and tax revenue, and distribute part of the income to citizens to alleviate poverty, said Finance Minister Sangajav Bayartsogt. The fund, to be run by professional managers from 2013, will disburse part of its annual income to every Mongolian in cash or non-cash securities to let them own stakes in the country’s mining wealth, Bayartsogt said. Initial capital will be drawn from Ivanhoe Mines Ltd.’s $4 billion Oyu Tolgoi copper- gold mine project, estimated to generate $30 billion in tax revenue over 50 years, he said.
'We’re drafting the idea to implement the proposal, and we’re studying examples like the Alaskan Permanent Fund,' Bayartsogt said in a Sept. 9 interview in the capital Ulaanbaatar, declining to specify the size of the proposed fund.
Mongolia, whose 2.7 million citizens depend on mining and agriculture for half the nation’s 2008 economic output, is banking on Oyu Tolgoi and about 6,000 other mineral deposit sites to lift average annual income, which at $1,680 per person last year was ranked 151st in the world by the World Bank.
'If the government can pull this off, we can expect lasting stability and growth in Mongolia, because this fund can help stabilize the economy and help fend off the boom and burst of the commodity-price cycles,' said Erdenedalai Choinkhor, an analyst at Frontier Securities Co. in Ulaanbaatar. The $40 billion Alaska Permanent Fund, created in 1976 with state revenue from oil production, has constitutionally protected capital that can’t be spent. Most of its earnings are reinvested, and a dividend is returned each year to eligible Alaskans. The fund reported a $6.3 million loss in 2001 after buying 685,600 shares in Enron Corp. Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, the 2.47 trillion-krone ($410 billion) Government Pension Fund - Global, derives money from taxes on oil and gas and ownership of petroleum fields. The oil and gas money is invested abroad to avoid stoking domestic inflation.
Mongolia also wants to diversify the economy’s reliance on animal husbandry and mining to avoid the so-called Dutch Disease, where a commodity boom sucks in foreign exchange, raises the currency’s value and makes manufacturing less competitive."
read more: Bloomberg
9/10/2009
| Sep2007 |
Dec2007 |
Mar2008 |
Jun2008 |
Sep2008 |
Dec2008 |
Mar2009 |
Jun2009 |
| 3,190 |
3,130 |
3,300 |
3,789 |
3,927 |
3,976 |
3,587 |
3,628 |
|
**The above data has been pulled on specific dates. Market size reflects official disclosure, fund creation, investment activity, capital injections, and other variables.
9/10/2009
China’s sovereign-wealth fund is looking to invest in U.S. real estate, possibly even through a government program created to help bail out struggling banks, The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday, citing people familiar with the matter.
Officials from China Investment Corporation have, in recent weeks, been talking to private-equity fund managers such as BlackRock (BLK: 202.12, 2.8, 1.4%), Invesco and Lone Star about investing in distressed real estate assets including mortgages and physical property, the Journal said.
In addition, the paper reported, CIC is considering investment in distressed assets through the Public-Private Investment Program, or PPIP, which was designed to help banks unload toxic assets with U.S. government assistance to help the financial system recover from its near-collapse.
read more: Fox Business
9/8/2009
Bloomberg reports, "Guan Ong, former chief investment officer of South Korea’s sovereign wealth fund, is setting up a hedge fund to trade Asian bonds that he forecasts will benefit from a period of economic uncertainty.
Blue Rice Investment Management’s BRIM Asian Credit Fund, which will trade the region’s dollar-denominated debt, will target annual returns of 10 percent to 15 percent, Ong, 49, said in an interview yesterday. The fund aims to start with as much as $30 million, including Ong’s own money, in October or November, he said.
'The global credit market dislocations have provided an attractive entry point for investments into an Asian credit absolute return strategy, for at least the next three to five years,' said Singapore-based Ong, who drove the out-performance of Asian bond portfolios while at Prudential Financial Inc.
More than $1.6 trillion of losses and writedowns since credit markets froze following the collapse of the U.S. subprime housing market in 2007 have forced banks and global fund houses to reduce investments in Asia, fueling trading opportunities. "
read more: Bloomberg
9/7/2009
Xinhua states, "Kuwait's sovereign wealth fund said Sunday it will keep stakes in Citigroup Inc. and Merrill Lynch & Co. despite the tumble in shareholder value.
'The authority has no intention of selling its holdings in Merrill Lynch or Citigroup in the near term, since the investment policies are based on a long-term vision,' the Kuwait Investment Authority said in a statement.
In January 2008, the agency pumped three billion U.S. dollars into Citigroup and another two billion dollars in Merrill Lynch, a big step amid the spreading global financial turmoil. However, the deals have drawn criticism from some members of the Kuwaiti parliament after the shareholder value shrank in harsh economic climate. The statement was also a reply to questions from lawmaker al-Tabtabai, who said in February the sovereign wealth fund lost 9 billion dinars (around 30.1 billion dollars) from March to December last year."
read more: Xinhua
9/4/2009
Reuters states, "Australia's $50 billion sovereign wealth fund increased its exposure to bonds and alternative assets in the June quarter as it saw opportunities emerge from the market turmoil of the past year. The government-run Future Fund is the nation's largest single investment fund, and was set up in 2006 to cover future public pension liabilities. In its latest portfolio update for the three months to June 30, released on Friday, the fund said its substantial investments in credit markets helped it avoid some of the more extreme declines in equities over the past year."
read more: Reuters
9/3/2009
PE Hub states, "China is planning new rules that will allow foreign companies to set up locally registered partnerships, a copy of a draft regulation showed, a landmark move aimed at attracting foreign investments.
Foreign firms and nationals who want to start local partnerships must seek approval from China’s Ministry of Commerce, according to document obtained by Reuters from industry sources. Two or more foreign nationals can apply to the commerce ministry, or local government agencies authorised by the commerce ministry, for approval to set up locally registered partnerships.
Foreign companies with good track records in business and have been in operation for at least three straight years can apply. Foreign firms and nationals can also choose to cooperate with Chinese companies and citizens to apply to set up a jointly invested partnership company in China."
read more: PE Hub
9/3/2009
Reuters states, "Nigeria's Senate is working on legislation to create a sovereign wealth fund aimed at softening any impact falling oil prices may have on the OPEC member's economy, the finance minister said on Wednesday. Mansur Muhtar told Reuters a presidential committee of top Nigerian economic advisers had sent lawmakers a draft proposal for the fund after deliberating on it for more than a year. The fund could allow a certain percentage of the nation's revenues to be invested in international markets, providing protection during a downturn in oil prices. Nigeria, sub-Saharan Africa's second biggest economy, has around $41.6 billion dollars in foreign exchange reserves, the central bank said on Tuesday.
'The senate is now working on the proposals made by the presidential committee with a view to coming out with a legislation that will guide and empower the government in setting up the fund,' Muhtar said before a cabinet meeting.
Resource-rich countries from Saudi Arabia to Norway established multi-billion dollar state-run funds, which invest in foreign stocks, bonds and other financial instruments, to help diversify their holdings. Nigeria's economy still depends largely on the rise and fall of volatile oil markets, which have traded between $100 and $34 in the past 12 months. Africa's most populous country depends on oil and gas income for more than 80 percent of its revenues. But the idea of public money being invested overseas has sparked some concerns in a country struggling with power outages, decrepit roads and underfunded hospitals and schools."
read more: Reuters
9/2/2009
The press release states, "Qatari Diar and VINCI announce that they have held exclusive negotiations that have resulted in the following proposal: Qatari Diar is to contribute its subsidiary CEGELEC to VINCI in exchange for an equity holding in VINCI. This contribution is envisaged on the basis of 31.5 million VINCI shares for 100% of CEGELEC.
Qatari Diar would accordingly become VINCI’s largest shareholder behind the Group’s employee savings funds.
This transaction, aimed at underpinning an ambitious business project, would fit into the dynamics of a strategic partnership between Qatari Diar and VINCI. This partnership would combine enhanced business cooperation and the finalisation of a stable shareholding agreement between the two partners. In accordance with regulatory provisions, the project will be submitted first to employee representative bodies for consultation and will also have to be cleared by the competent competition authorities."
read more: Vinci Press Release
9/2/2009
The Australian reports, "the $58 billion Future Fund is believed to have given board approval to aggressively bid on shopping centres in Australia and Britain to the tune of $800 million. Sources close to the transactions said the Future Fund had reactivated an offer to buy a stake in the Bullring shopping centre in Birmingham. In January, The Times reported that developer British Land was negotiating to sell its 33per cent stake to the Future Fund for pound stg. 200m ($387m); however, a deal was not struck at the time.
British property values have crashed by about 40 per cent over the past year, while Australian values have fallen about 25 per cent. However, markets are beginning to stabilise and big investors, such as German funds, have poured into the London commercial market.
The Future Fund was concerned it might miss opportunities to buy at the bottom of the real estate cycle, the source said. The fund, which was established by the federal government to meet the cost of public sector superannuation, added $2.37bn to its cash kitty last month by selling a third of its holding in Telstra. The Future Fund is also the frontrunner to buy the $450m-plus Lakeside Joondalup shopping centre in Perth, which is owned by the unlisted ING Retail Property Fund. The centre had been valued at $490m in June."
read more: The Australian
8/29/2009
Bloomberg reports, "Norges Bank Investment Management, which oversees Europe’s largest sovereign wealth fund, named a new team of executives after record losses last year wiped out gains from 12 years of investing Norway’s oil and gas revenue.
The 2.47 trillion-krone ($410 billion) Government Pension Fund - Global promoted Bengt Enge to chief investment officer, Trond Grande to chief risk officer and Age Bakker to chief operating officer, the Oslo-based fund said today. Mark Clemens from Citigroup Inc. will be chief administrative officer and Jessica Irschick from UBS AG chief treasurer.
'NBIM now has a management team with considerable international financial markets experience, Yngve Slyngstad, the chief executive officer of the fund, said in a statement. Deputy CEO Stephen Hirsh also remains in his position."
read more: Bloomberg
8/29/2009
AFP reports, "China's state sovereign wealth fund has bailed out the heavily indebted majority owner of London's Canary Wharf, according to the real estate development's owner. The Financial Times reported that the move by China Investment Corporation (CIC) was its first big investment in Britain. The owners of Canary Wharf, Songbird Estates, said in a statement that CIC would form a consortium with Qatar Holding, the Qatari sovereign wealth fund, and a number of existing investors, to provide more than 800 million pounds in new equity. The money is needed to pay 880 million pounds that Songbird owes to US bank Citigroup.
David Pritchard, the chairman of Songbird, said the deal had saved Songbird from bankruptcy.
"This deal secures the future of Songbird on the best possible basis for our shareholders," he added.
Qatar will become the largest shareholder in the group with a stake of just below 30 percent with US private investor Simon Glick taking 27 per cent and CIC taking around 19 percent, the Financial Times said. The Canary Wharf development in east London's Docklands houses the offices of major banks and media and newspaper groups."
read more: AFP
8/29/2009
Reuters reports, "Qatar Holding LLC aims to become the largest shareholder in Songbird Estates, owner of much of London's Canary Wharf office complex, the investment arm of the Qatari wealth fund said late on Friday.
'Qatar Holding has today announced that following the proposed equity issue and loan repayment by Songbird Estates Plc ... it intends to become the largest shareholder in the company,' the group said in a statement.
Qatar's sovereign wealth fund on Friday joined China Investment Corporation to subcribe to 275 million pounds ($447.9 million) in preference shares issued by Songbird."
read more: Reuters
8/26/2009
Economic Observer News states, "The CIC has reached an agreement with the Ministry of Finance (MOF) to treat the ＄200 billion US dollars used to originally finance the company as assets rather than a debt, a source from the CIC told the EO. This means that CIC will no longer be required to make regular interest payments to the state, which will, to some extent, ease the pressure on CIC in terms of payments. In late 2007, in order to fund CIC, the MOF bought foreign exchange from the central bank paid for by issuing special treasury bonds worth 1.55 trillion yuan (＄226.9 billion) at an annual rate of 4.3 percent. As a result, CIC has been required to pay about 66.65 billion yuan (＄9.76 billion) in interest to the state each year. However, this is about to change and CIC will, like other central state-owned enterprises, likely pay dividends at regular intervals to the state."
read more: Economic Observer News
8/25/2009
In conjunction with its 35th anniversary, Temasek Holdings (Temasek) today released an updated Temasek Charter.
Speaking at the launch, Temasek Chairman, Mr S Dhanabalan, said, "Temasek's mission remains to create and deliver sustainable long-term returns for our stakeholders. We have refined our Charter to more clearly articulate our focus as a value-oriented investor, and also as a shareholder focused on achieving sustainable returns by engaging with the boards and management of our portfolio companies. We will continue to review our Temasek Charter regularly, and update it as needed in consultation with our shareholder, to ensure that it remains relevant to our current activities and aspirations as an institution."
First published in 2002 and updated in 2009, the Temasek Charter re-affirms the role of Temasek as an active investor and value-adding shareholder to deliver sustainable long-term value.
read more: Temasek Press Release
8/20/2009
The press release states, "The Future Fund Board of Guardians (the Board) has sold 684.4 million Telstra shares at a price of $3.47 (gross proceeds $2.37 billion) through an underwritten sale to institutional investors.
The sell-down is in line with the Board’s previously stated plan to reduce the portfolio’s holding in Telstra in an orderly manner over the medium term and to build a portfolio consistent with its long term mandate and strategy.
The sale reduces the Future Fund portfolio’s holding in Telstra from 16.4% of the company to 10.9%. The sale price represents a discount of 4.9% to the day’s closing price and the volume sold represents approximately 13 days of average trading volume in the stock.
The Board took the view that current market conditions were conducive to a partial sell-down of the holding."
read more: Future Fund Press Release
8/18/2009
The release states, "the network is being sold by the French nuclear giant EDF for £4 billion and the Deutsche Bank and Barclays have been appointed to prepare for the sale, which is expected to start next month. The arm of EDF’s business which is up for sale is made up of three regional networks in London, the east and south-east which supply power to around eight million homes. However, the networks are likely to be sold as a whole, with potential bidders including the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, Cheung Kong Infrastructure and the group owned by Li Ka-shing, Asia’s richest man. Other offers are also expected from three Canadian pension funds - Borealis, Ontario Teachers, and Canadian Pension Plan, as well as utility company Scottish & Southern and network monopoly National Grid."
read more: UK Trade & Investment
8/17/2009
Roger Jenkins, Barclays' top dealmaker, with a personal wealth of $200 million, said on Friday he is leaving the British bank to set up a new corporate finance advisory firm targeting sovereign wealth investors. The departure of Jenkins, one of Barclays' highest paid bankers and a key figure in its fundraising with Middle East investors last year, was not a surprise after being widely reported last month.
His new advisory business will have offices in the Middle East, Europe and California. Jenkins said on Friday the new firm will provide corporate finance advice to clients and look for alternative investment opportunities. It will focus on sovereign wealth investors and help raise and invest money, as well as handle existing portfolios.
He will continue to work with Barclays in the future, advising on its business in the Middle East and supporting the development of the bank's sovereign wealth client group. "Now is a good time for a change," he said in a statement.
read more: Thomson Reuters
8/14/2009
The press release reports, "The family shareholders Porsche and Piëch as holders of the ordinary shares in Porsche Automobil Holding SE (Porsche SE), Stuttgart,
have come to an agreement with Qatar Holding LLC (QH), Doha, that the Emirate of Qatar takes a stake in Porsche SE. According to this agreement, QH shall acquire ten percent of the ordinary shares from the holding of the family shareholders. Through this investment the old as well as the new holders of the ordinary shares intend to support the targeted combination of Porsche and Volkswagen. In case that the combination will not take place, QH is entitled to resell its stake in Porsche SE to the families.
In conjunction therewith Porsche SE and QH have reached an agreement over the sale of the majority of the cash settled options relating to Volkswagen shares. The transaction makes available for Porsche SE cash in the amount of more than EUR one billion currently serving as collateral for the options structure. At the end of July, Porsche had already taken the decision to carry out the devaluation of the options structure in a considerable amount in order to prepare such sale. The transaction does not trigger an additional need for devaluation.
Part of Qatars' commitment is a binding undertaking of QH to participate in the existing syndicated loan - provided by 16 banks - with an amount of up to EUR 265 million. The supervisory board of Porsche SE has authorized the transaction. The respective contracts shall be signed in Stuttgart this Friday."
Qatar Holding, LLC will acquire from Porsche Automobil Holding SE cash settled options on Volkswagen shares which is around 17% of Volkswagen ordinary shares. This will probably happen after the closing of the transaction and having passed all regulatory approvals.
read more: Porsche Press Release
8/14/2009
Times Online reports, "Shares in British Land continued to rise today, putting pressure on the FTSE 100 property company to clarify its position amid reports that it could face a bid worth up to £10 billion. A consortium including the Mittal steelmaking family and Abu Dhabi's ruling family is said to have approached Credit Suisse about the possibility of hatching a move on the owner of Broadgate Circle, in the City. British Land, which in February bolstered its balance sheet with a £740 million rights issue, declined to comment this morning, and the mooted members of the consortium could not be reached. Shares in the FTSE 100 company rose by 25p, or 5.25 per cent, to 519.92p amid whispers of bid interest. Sovereign wealth funds and the state-owned China Investment Corporation were both cited as possible suitors. "
read more: Times Online
8/13/2009
Asia One reports, "the investments Temasek Holdings has made in rights issues over the past eight months have surged by around 184 per cent on the back of rocketing global equity markets. Data compiled by The Straits Times from public information shows that Temasek has spent about US$2.9 billion (S$4.2 billion) subscribing to new shares of companies in which it already holds stakes.It began its round of investments by taking up new shares in Standard Chartered Bank in November. It has also joined cash calls made by DBS Group Holdings, Indonesia's Bank Danamon, CapitaLand, Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing and Neptune Orient Lines.
In a rights issue, a company sells new shares to raise capital. Shares are offered - usually at a discount to the current price - to existing investors in proportion to their holding."
read more: Asia One
8/11/2009
Bloomberg reports, "Brazil may tap its 15.8 billion real ($8.6 billion) sovereign wealth fund next year to help finance spending without widening the budget deficit, Planning and Budget Minister Paulo Bernardo said.
Tax collections may lag behind an expected economic recovery in 2010 because some companies have ways to postpone taxes on earnings until the following year, Bernardo said during an interview in Brasilia. Tax revenue fell 1.9 percent in the first half of 2009 from a year earlier.
'If tax collection is not as good, we will use the sovereign fund,' Bernardo said. 'I don’t think we will need the sovereign wealth fund this year. Next year, we may.'
Drawing on the fund will allow President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s administration, amid an election year, to avoid cuts to spending should economic growth or tax revenue falter. Lula’s administration will also have room to extend tax breaks granted this year to boost the recovery if needed."
read more: Bloomberg
8/11/2009
  
According to the Press Release, "Pursuant to CVM Instruction 358 of January 3, 2002, Cyrela Commercial Properties S.A. Empreendimentos e Participações (“CCP”), a commercial property development and leasing company with shares traded on the São Paulo Stock Exchange (BOVESPA) under the ticker CCPR3, informs its shareholders and the market in general that, on July 7, 2009, it entered into an agreement establishing the basis for a joint venture with BRCOMPROP DEVELOPMENT JV PRIVATE LIMITED, an affiliate of GIC Real Estate, the real estate investment arm of the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (“GIC Real Estate”) and CPPIB US RE-A, INC, subsidiary of the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, (“CPPIB”), with the purpose of acquiring, holding, developing, building, leasing, managing and selling assets in the retail, industrial and office real estate segment in Brazil (“Joint Venture”).
The investments of GIC Real Estate and CPPIB will be made through CCP18 DE MASTER LIMITED PARTNERSHIP, a company especially set up for this purpose pursuant to the laws of the state of Delaware, United States of America, with CCP Asset Management LLC, a whollyowned subsidiary of CCP, as its general partner (“Company”) being responsible for the allocation and management of the funds committed. The Company, in turn, will directly or indirectly invest, jointly with CCP, in specific purpose companies headquartered in Brazil, which will invest in retail, industrial and office real estate properties.
The investments committed by the parties to achieve the objectives of the Joint Venture total US$ 400 (four hundred) million and will be made in the ratio of 25% by CCP, 37.5% by GIC Real Estate and 37.5% by CPPIB.
This Joint Venture aims to combine CCP’s expertise in the Brazilian commercial real estate markets (office buildings, shopping centers and industrial facilities), with GIC Real Estate’s and CPPIB’s global investment expertise.
This partnership underlines CCP’s commitment to the Brazilian real estate market and its confidence on the growth prospects for the commercial property sector in the country.
read more: Cyrela Commercial Properties S.A - Press Release
8/7/2009
Property Wire reports, "An example is Singapore's sovereign wealth fund, the Government Investment Corporation that recently ran the numbers on a half stake in the $485 million Sydney office tower, 1 Martin Place, owned by two Macquarie Group property funds. Other buyers included private investors from Malaysia, Indonesia and Hong Kong. 'Most are out of Singapore. There are not many from China, but China Investment Corporation has recently had injected $200 million into the troubled Goodman Group,' he added. The Korea Investment Corporation was also looking for acquisition opportunities, Brooke said. Last month Woori Investment and Securities, an arm of South Korea's largest financial company, had looked at Investa Property Group-owned office towers in Sydney and Melbourne for about $600 million."
read more: Property Wire
8/6/2009
Reuters reports that, "Singapore's biggest sovereign wealth fund GIC said on Tuesday that the greatest risk facing Asia is a global economic and financial environment that does not stabilise and recover by 2010.
'If the U.S. economy turns out to be worse than expected, requirements for banks' capital will be higher and the U.S. administration might need to go back to Congress to ask for additional funding,' Tony Tan, deputy chairman of the Government of Singapore Investment Corp said in a speech.
'Downside risks remain high, despite signs of stabilisation,' he said."
read more: Reuters
8/6/2009
9-12 November 2009
Venue: The Hilton - Sydney
Infrastructure Investment World Australia 2009 has been developed as a leading national forum that brings government together with financiers, investors and a range of public and private sector enterprises to deliver these projects with positive outcomes for all stakeholders.
read more: Terrapinn
8/5/2009
Wall Street Journal reports that, "Australia will relax its screening of some foreign investment deals in a bid to improve the nation's attractiveness as an investment destination, Treasurer Wayne Swan said. Private foreign investment, including deals by privately held and listed companies, in Australian firms valued at less than 219 million Australian dollars (US$184.6 million) will proceed without review. The move eliminates four lower monetary thresholds under which deals were subject to national-interest tests."
read more: Wall Street Journal
8/2/2009
Khaleej Times reports that, "Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFJ) has put together a syndicated loan worth five billion dollars for a sovereign wealth fund in Abu Dhabi, a report said Sunday.
Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, part of the MUFJ group, has arranged the multibank credit for International Petroleum Investment Co. (IPIC), the business daily Nikkei reported, without citing sources.
The syndicate also involves 15 other banks, including Santander of Spain, HSBC Holdings Plc. of Britain and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp of Japan, the report said."
read more: Khaleej Times
7/31/2009
Bloomberg reports that, "France’s sovereign wealth fund may spend 900 million euros ($1.3 billion) before the end of the year and increase aid to the auto industry in 2010, as the recession batters companies’ finances. The 20 billion-euro investment pool, set up last year by President Nicolas Sarkozy, may provide capital to suppliers of Airbus SAS and Safran SA and open a fund for smaller companies, said Gilles Michel, managing director of the fund.
'The effect of the crisis on companies is worsening,' Michel said in an interview in Paris late yesterday. 'Many companies are facing financial pressure.'
The fund, created last year to protect companies the government considered strategic from “foreign predators,” has spent almost 600 million euros so far this year, meaning total investment may reach 1.5 billion euros in 2009. French gross domestic product may shrink 3 percent this year, the most since 1949, the national statistics agency estimates."
read more: Bloomberg
7/31/2009
Chief executive Ho Ching said the fund had already been approached by institutional investors regarding such deals. Temasek is considering including outside investors in single projects as well as the possibility of creating a fund to invest in multiple projects.
This comes a week after the company parted ways with Chip Goodyear, who was to take over the chief executive position in October. Goodyear will now leave the company in August. Temasek has not given a reason behind this decision, saying only that “the Temasek board and Mr Goodyear have concluded and accepted that there are differences regarding certain strategic issues that could not be resolved.” Despite the value of Temasek’s assets plunging by more than SGD$40bn ($27.7bn) in the 12 months ended 31 March, the fund has had an annual return of about 18 per cent a year since its launch in 1974.
read more: AltAssets
7/28/2009
Press release states, "Finmeccanica, the Italian leading aerospace, defence and security company and the Libyan Investment Authority (“LIA”), the Libyan sovereign wealth fund, and Libya Africa Investment Portfolio(“LAP”), an Investment Fund owned by LIA, share the view that Libya and the Middle East and Africa countries will offer, in the near future, significant investment opportunities in a broad range of industrial sectors in which Finmeccanica is present at a global level and they intend to leverage on their joint capabilities to access new markets working with local customers and partners.
In this context, Finmeccanica, LIA and LAP have today signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the development of a strategic cooperation in Libya and other countries in the Middle East and Africa regions. Under this MoU investment opportunities will be pursued in the aerospace, electronics, transportation and energy sectors for civil applications.
The MoU envisages the creation within a year of a Joint Venture Company, 50% held by each of Finmeccanica and LAP, and governed by Shareholders Agreements to be entered into. The Joint Venture Company will be the main vehicle of the joint business initiatives and will be able to invest in the specific commercial and industrial initiatives by setting up dedicated companies in the relevant countries. Finmeccanica can involve the Joint Venture Company as preferred business partner in initiatives in which Finmeccanica will take a direct leading role.
read more: Press Release
7/23/2009
Bloomberg reports that, "Qatar’s ruling emir, who toppled his father in a bloodless coup in 1995, has come out on top of another power struggle thousands of miles away in Germany, where the Porsche dynasty is losing control of the sports-car maker. Porsche SE yesterday agreed to combine with Volkswagen AG after a four-year attempt to take over the larger German rival left Porsche paralyzed with debt. Qatar will own 17 percent of VW with options accumulated from Porsche, making the Gulf kingdom the third-largest investor in Europe’s biggest carmaker. Qatar used its $63 billion sovereign wealth fund to give the world’s second-richest country behind Liechtenstein investment clout, snapping up stakes in established brands or troubled companies in need of cash. Four years after its inception, the fund has become the biggest shareholder in Barclays Plc, J. Sainsbury Plc and Credit Suisse AG."
read more: Bloomberg
7/23/2009
According to the Reuters, "A New Zealand fund that will use private capital to help fund public infrastructure works has signed up the state pension fund as its first investor, the manager of the fund said on Thursday. The New Zealand Superannuation fund will contribute up to NZ$100 million ($66 million) to a fund with an initial investment limit of NZ$500 million, to be managed by infrastructure investment firm HRL Morrison and Co. The Public Infrastructure Partnership Fund (PIP) is raising funds to build social infrastructure such as schools, student accommodation and hospitals, said Morrison and Co spokesman Peter Coman."
read more: Reuters
7/21/2009
read more: Linaburg-Maduell Transparency Index
7/19/2009
According to the Reuters, "China Investment Corp (CIC), the country's $200 billion sovereign wealth fund, has agreed to buy a 40 percent stake in investment firm CITIC Capital Holdings Ltd, the official China Securities Journal reported on Monday. CIC will buy new shares to be issued by Hong Kong-based CITIC Capital, in which CITIC Pacific and CITIC International Financial Holdings Ltd each hold 50 percent, the newspaper said, citing a letter sent to CITIC Capital investors. It gave no figure for the value of the deal. Both CITIC Pacific and CITIC International are units of CITIC Group, China's biggest financial conglomerate."
read more: Reuters
7/19/2009
According to the Reuters, "The Kuwaiti Investment Authority (KIA) may be considering investing in German auto parts supplier Continental AG (CONG.DE), German business weekly WirtschaftsWoche reported on Saturday.
In an article flagged 'Continental: The auto parts supplier talks to the sovereign wealth fund of the emirate of Kuwait over possible investment,' the magazine said 'Kuwaiti investors' have been in contact with Chief Executive Karl-Thomas Neumann in the past few days.
The investors also held a meeting in Hanover with the premier of Continental's home state of Lower Saxony, Christian Wulff, to discuss the political feasibility of a possible investment, the weekly said."
read more: Reuters
7/18/2009
According to the Xinhua, "China's Central Bank Governor Zhou Xiaochuan said Friday that the country's foreign exchange reserve should not be seen as "an investment fund", so it should not be looked on as a profit source.
"If the foreign exchange reserve can produce reasonable returns, it is good enough," Zhou said at Peking University when delivering a speech.
China had reserves of 2.13 trillion U.S. dollars in June, the largest in the world.
He said the increase in the reserve could bring the country many advantages, adding that agencies using foreign exchange reserve to invest should endeavor to guarantee security and value appreciation, without specifying the names of the agencies. In 2007, China set up the China Investment Corporation, with a registered capital of 200 billion U.S. dollars. The Beijing-based company is investing in equities, fixed income and alternative assets worldwide."
read more: Xinhua
7/14/2009
According to the article, "Seoul, is preparing to invest approximately $2.25 billion in private equity, real estate and hedge funds, the KIC's first move into alternative investments, said Scott E. Kalb, chief investment officer. Private equity strategies will include LBO, mezzanine, distressed, growth capital and venture capital, according to the fund's 2008 annual report.
Although KIC officials have been planning the moves for more than a year, 2008 wasn't the right time to start making investments, Mr. Kalb said. 'Last year was not an alpha year; it was a capital preservation year.'"
read more: Pensions & Investments
7/13/2009
On July 13th, 2009, the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute announced the launch of lmbourse™, Private Institutional Buyer Centric Marketplace. The asset & fund listing platform, is located at www.lmbourse.com. Utilizing connectivity, diligence, privacy and technology, the business segment aims to bring liquidity back to the global marketplace.
“Our raison d'etre is to create superior value-added services for our participants,” said Michael Maduell, Co-President of the Lmbourse™.
For buyers, the platform offers the ability to find investment funds and assets that will potentially generate alpha and positive returns. Among other things, lmbourse™ offers the chance to save financial resources since many institutional investors struggle with building internal teams and systems to access investment opportunities. For sellers/fund raisers who are approved, the platform offers them the chance to list their asset/funds, increasing opportunities for indication of interest among our network of investors.
All questions and media inquiries may be directed to contact@lmbourse.com.
visit: lmbourse
7/11/2009
AFP reports that, "the German luxury sports car maker Porsche has scheduled an extraordinary meeting of its supervisory board on July 23 to discuss offers by Qatar and Volkswagen, sources said on Friday. A Porsche spokesman confirmed the meeting, while a source close to the supervisory board said the Qatar and VW offers would be discussed. Invitations were extended by Wolfgang Porsche, head of the supervisory board, the spokesman said.
Heavily-indebted Porsche recently received an offer from the Qatar Investment Authority and has expressed confidence it would reach agreement on selling a direct stake in Porsche along with VW stock options.
A deal would allow Porsche to pay off some of the nine billion euros (12.6 billion dollars) in debt it accumulated trying to increase its holding in VW, the biggest European car maker. Porsche currently owns about 51 percent of VW. But VW has also made a counteroffer for 49 percent of Porsche's core sportscar operations in a boardroom drama between the carmakers' dominant influences, the Porsche and Piech families. Discussions with Qatar have been troubled by the dispute between the two groups."
read more: AFP
7/9/2009
Reuters reports that, "Singapore's state investor Temasek is in talks with a unit of Bank of China to launch a $1 billion to $2 billion investment fund to focus on fast-growing infrastructure projects across China, sources said on Thursday. Talks between Singapore's sovereign wealth fund and BOC International, the investment banking arm of Bank of China, were in the early stages but both had agreed on the general idea of the fund plan, said the sources, who had direct knowledge of the plan.
'This is an initiative led by BOC International. The two sides are talking,' said one of the sources.
Temasek and Bank of China aimed to set up a joint venture to manage the fund, which would seek investment opportunities emerging from China's 4 trillion yuan ($585.5 billion) economic stimulus package launched late last year, the sources said."
read more: Reuters
7/7/2009
China Investment Corp. has set up its international advisory board, which will have its first meeting soon, Jesse Wang, executive vice president of China's $200 billion sovereign wealth fund, said Saturday. Wang, who was speaking on the sidelines of the Global Think Tank Summit in Beijing, didn't elaborate.
Set up in 2007 and capitalized by Beijing, CIC is one of the world's largest and most widely followed sovereign wealth funds. The board will help advise the young fund on its investment strategy. CIC officials have acknowledged in the past they lack experience in investing, and the fund continues to beef up its operations by hiring more talent and setting up new departments as it expands its investments.
read more: The Wall Street Journal
7/6/2009
China Daily states that, "The Qatar Investment Promotion Department is planning to establish an office in China next year to facilitate mutual investments between the two countries, a company executive said today.
The office will be set up in Beijing, according to Farzam Kamalabadi, President and Chairman of Future Trends International (Group) Corporation, a China-specialist US Corporation engaged in investment and trade consulting, media relations, and government lobbying.
The office will help Qatar investors, including Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, to seek investment opportunities in sectors such as banks, real estate, water treatment, infrastructure and chemical in China, said Kamalabadi, who once served as senior adviser to a number of national oil systems such as Oman, Iran, Kuwait, and China."
read more: China Daily
7/3/2009
Press Release states that, "Teck Resources Limited ("Teck") (TSX:TCK.A and TCK.B, NYSE:TCK] announced today that China Investment Corporation (”CIC”) has agreed to purchase through a wholly-owned subsidiary 101.3 million Class B subordinate voting shares of Teck for C$17.21 per share. Teck will apply the net proceeds of the transaction to reduce outstanding bank debt. On closing, CIC will indirectly hold approximately 17.5 per cent of Teck’s outstanding Class B subordinate voting shares, representing approximately 17.2 per cent equity and 6.7 per cent voting interests in Teck. Upon completion of the transaction, Teck’s Class A shareholders as a group will hold a 61.8 per cent voting interest in Teck with Temagami Mining Company Ltd. holding a 28.5 per cent voting interest.
Teck President and CEO Don Lindsay said: 'This transaction will have an immediate and very positive effect on Teck’s balance sheet, and represents an attractive opportunity for Teck to establish a relationship with a major Chinese financial investor, with a deep understanding of China, the world’s largest consumer of our principal products.'"
read more: Press Release
7/3/2009
AFP reports that, "French state-controlled nuclear giant Areva said Tuesday it was opening its capital to new investors and would sell a subsidiary to raise money for massive investments in new nuclear technology.
The company also said it was considering the sale of its stakes in French metal mining group Eramet and Geneva-based computer chip maker STMicroelectronics.
The Financial Times reported earlier that the French government was preparing a capital increase and could sell a 15-percent stake to Asian and Middle Eastern investors for two billion euros (2.8 billion dollars).
The FT reported Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI), Areva's Japanese partner, was set to take a stake in the French company. MHI told AFP it had not received an offer to buy a stake but would study such a proposal. The French government is also in talks with sovereign wealth funds such as Mubadala of Abu Dhabi over their participation in a capital increase, which will be launched later this year, the FT said. France produces most of its electricity from nuclear power and French energy groups like EDF, Total and GDF Suez have previously been touted as possible investors in Areva. The report comes amid growing interest in nuclear power around the world, sparked by fears of climate change, worries about the reliability of supplies from the Middle East and Russia and record high oil prices in 2008."
read more: AFP
6/29/2009
The founders of the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute, during a meeting on June 10 in Tokyo, authorized the announcement of plans to unveil a new business segment that will provide asset and fund listing services.
"The private institutional buyer centric marketplace will be an efficient, global alternative investment solution that utilizes connectivity, diligence, privacy and technology," said Michael Maduell, CEO "This unique platform will systematically provide buyers and investors with the necessary tools to select investment funds and assets."
The new business segment will provide the following features:
Anonymity
Breadth
Efficiency
Diligence
Liquidity
The name of the segment will be announced at the time of launch which will take place within the next month. Through the listing platform, Investors are able to access and search for hedge, equity, and private equity funds completely free of charge. In addition, they may also browse for institutional grade assets like real estate offices to large scale infrastructure projects. Active participants are selected and carefully screened before given access to the buyer centric marketplace.
"This is a brand new approach to a rather untapped marketplace that we have discovered during a unique time of recovery for the global business environment," said Maduell. "Not only will investors, including sovereign wealth funds and other institutional buyers, be able to able to find high quality investments at favorable prices, but legitimate sellers and fund managers will be able to gather exposure on their opportunities, and potentially tap into needed liquidity."
The scheduled launch of the new business segment will be announced on the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute web site at www.swfinstitute.org estimated within the next month. All questions and media inquiries may be directed to swfinstitute@swfinstitute.org.
read more: PRESS RELEASE
6/25/2009
see video: BNN
6/23/2009
According to Gulf News, "Dubai government stakes in Galadari Group have been transferred to the Investment Corporation of Dubai (ICD) as stated in decree No 18 of 2009, issued by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.
The ICD is the investment arm of Dubai government and has a portfolio ranging across all spheres of the economy, including finance, transportation, utilities and energy, industrial, real estate and leisure.
Under the decree, all stakes were transferred to the ICD which replaces Dubai government in all rights and liabilities."
read more: Gulf News
6/22/2009
Europe’s largest oil company, made a natural gas discovery at a record depth in the northern Norwegian Sea that may equal the size of Norway’s annual production of the fuel. The find may the biggest since Ormen Lange in 1997. Norway, the world’s fifth-largest oil exporter and second-biggest gas supplier, is boosting gas output to make up for dwindling crude production after 40 years of pumping oil. The country is opening more of its unexplored northern waters to drilling in areas such as the Norwegian Sea.
Shell, operator of the prospect, made the find in a wildcat well at a depth of 1,376 meters (4,515 feet), the greatest water depth ever in Norway, the directorate said. Wildcat wells are drilled in zones not known to be productive. Shell holds a 50 percent stake in the field and StatoilHydro ASA 40 percent. GDF Suez SA bought a 10 percent stake from Shell on Dec. 23, in a deal that was approved by the Norwegian authorities late May.
read more: Bloomberg
6/19/2009
Reuters reports that, "Angola plans to launch a sovereign fund in 2009 to invest the oil-producing nation's wealth abroad, Finance Minister Severim de Morais said on Friday.
Plans to create the fund, known as the Fundo Soberano Angolano, were announced in November by President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, but the project has since been delayed due to the global economic downturn.
Asked whether the fund would be launched this year, de Morais replied: 'Yes, our aim is to launch the fund in 2009.'"
read more: Reuters
6/17/2009
Qatar will announce the details of the country's sovereign wealth fund's bid to buy into indebted German sports carmaker Porsche within two to three weeks, Qatar's prime minister said. Sheik Hamad Bin Jassem Al Thani refused to confirm reports that the Qatar Investment Authority is eying a 25 percent stake in Porsche Automobil Holding SE, saying that the investment fund is still in the negotiating stage about the stake.
In a meeting Tuesday night with businessmen in the Qatari capital, Hamad said the QIA and Porsche are legally bound to not disclose details for now. But "within two or three weeks, the picture will become clearer," the prime minister added.
read more: Business Week
6/16/2009
Press release states, "CIC participation in Finance Facility CIC has committed to the Facility on the same terms as those announced to the market on 19 May 2009. To facilitate CIC’s participation, Macquarie Bank and its associates have sold down A$15m of their exposure which combined with CIC’s commitment of A$200m takes the final Facility size to A$485m. The Facility will not be increased in size beyond A$485m. Goodman and CIC have agreed to work in good faith towards a broader relationship between
the two groups.
Greg Goodman, Group CEO of Goodman said: 'We are very pleased with the support shown to the Group by CIC and are excited about the opportunity to partner with an institution of this calibre as we seek to grow our business globally. We view a relationship with CIC as highly strategic and believe that together we can capitalise on the significant opportunities created by current market conditions.'
The key terms of the A$485 million Facility are as follows:
9 month term expiring in February 2010, extendable for a further 15 months; and
Secured facility with covenants comparable to those in Goodman’s existing common
terms deed poll.
In conjunction with the Facility, additional Options will be granted over 255.3 million Goodman stapled securities with a two year term (Options). These additional Options are to be issued with a strike price of $0.40 and the lenders will share the two tranches of Options on a pro rata basis.
Approval from Australia’s Foreign Investment Review Board will be sought in respect of CIC’s participation in the transaction. The issue of options (apart from the first 120 million Options which were issued within placement capacity) will also be subject to security holder approval. In the event that the Options are not approved by security holders, the lenders under the Facility will be entitled to a cash amount from Goodman equivalent to the value of the Options as if they had been granted and were exercised. Further details of this grant will be distributed as part of a notice of extraordinary general meeting."
read more: Goodman Press Release
6/12/2009
Wall Street Journal reports, "Alan Thompson, managing director for Latin America at Temasek Holdings, Singapore's sovereign wealth fund, agreed that Brazil's strong financial system is an important factor in the country's strong economic growth potential. Not a single bank failure has occurred in Brazil since September 2005 when Banco Santos was closed in what Brazilian bank regulators called an isolated event.
'Over the last two years, we recognized that the economic world order is changing,' said Thompson, who said Temasek has made several investments since establishing a presence in Brazil last year.
Thompson also said Brazil's moderate inflation of 4% was the result of well-developed institutions that drive monetary policy. He cited stable fiscal policy as the reason Brazil has become a net creditor to the rest of the world and accumulated $200 billion in foreign exchange reserves. The global financial community has recognized Brazil's new place in the world. Standard & Poor's upgraded Brazil's sovereign debt to investment grade last year. Foreign investors poured in a record $45 million of direct investment in 2008. "
read more: Wall Street Journal
6/12/2009
Wall Street Journal reports, "Renaissance Technologies founder James Simons this year took steps to retire from his famed hedge-fund firm but has put the plans on hold for now, people familiar with the discussions say. The firm won't discuss the reasons behind his moves. But Mr. Simons appears increasingly willing to part with at least some control of his hedge-fund firm, one of Wall Street's most famous, successful and secretive. The 71-year-old executive has traveled to China to talk with officials of the China Investment Corp., the $200 billion sovereign-wealth fund, about selling a multibillion-dollar stake in Renaissance, people with knowledge of the matter said. It isn't uncommon for leaders of investment-management firms to sell stakes as they approach retirement. The China talks, which took place last year, didn't lead to a deal, the people said. But this year, a top Renaissance executive told Wall Street associates that the firm could sell a stake, a person outside Renaissance who was involved in the talks said. CIC didn't respond to a request for comment."
read more: Wall Street Journal
6/8/2009
Reuters reports, "The chairman of the Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC), the city-state's biggest sovereign wealth fund, said on Monday the fund will be cautious and take few risks. His comments came after the country's other sovereign fund Temasek saw big losses on its investments in Western banks.
'GIC will be cautious, low risk,' said Lee Kuan Yew in a discussion at an aviation meeting in Malaysia.
Temasek's new American chief Chip Goodyear would, however, "seize opportunities", said Lee, Singapore's former prime minister and the father of current prime minister Lee Hsien Loong. "
read more: Reuters
6/4/2009
NY Times reports, "the Chinese government’s largest investment ever in a Western company, a proposed $19.5 billion stake in the Australian-British mining giant Rio Tinto Group, collapsed early Friday, dealing a blow both to China’s global corporate ambitions and to its efforts to gain clout in the natural resources market.
The board of Rio Tinto announced the decision after meeting in London on Thursday, saying the company had ended the deal it struck in February to sell the stake to China’s state-owned Aluminum Corporation of China, also known as Chinalco.
The board said in a statement early Friday that it had ended the deal with Chinalco and would raise about $20 billion by issuing new stock and forming a joint venture with its longtime rival, the Australian mining giant BHP Billiton, the world's largest mining company."
read more: NY Times
6/3/2009
"June 2nd 2009: Morgan Stanley (MS) announced that it had priced a public offering of common stock for proceeds of approximately US$2.2 billion. The proceeds are intended to fully redeem the TARP preferred capital before the end of June.
In view of the excellent relationship with CIC and the preemptive rights CIC holds, MS notified CIC of the offering. CIC sees this as an opportunity to strengthen its relationship with MS, and it decided to participate in the offering and subscribe $1.2 billion common stock.
CIC had existing investments in MS before this transaction. On Dec 19th, 2007,CIC purchased $5.6 billion mandatory convertible securities into MS common stock, representing approximately 9.86% equity ownership in MS. Following Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, inc.’s investment in MS in October 2008, CIC’s equity ownership was diluted to approximately 7.68%. This new purchase will bring CIC’s equity ownership in MS back to approximately 9.86%, effectively reducing CIC’s overall cost basis and increasing the returns potential.
MS is a leading global financial service firm providing a wide range of investment banking, securities, investment management and wealth management services. MS is widely expected to be able to leverage on its strengthened financial position and will be on the road of resuming its successful trajectory amid the dramatic restructuring of the international financial services industry.
CIC has further strengthened its relationship with MS through the new investments. CIC remains optimistic in MS’ future growth and progress."
read more: China Investment Corporation
6/2/2009
read more: Linaburg-Maduell Transparency Index
6/2/2009
"The Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation Board of Trustees authorized a new asset allocation and approved a manager search during their regular meeting on May 20 and 21 in Anchorage.
'We’re taking a fresh approach to how we view our asset allocation,' said Michael Burns, CEO 'We’re recognizing that some investments within an asset class may have more in common with other asset types with regard to expected risk and return. And since our goal at the highest level is to balance the risk and return of the total portfolio, it makes sense to segregate assets by their characteristics, rather than simply by type.'
The new asset allocation is as follows:
2% - Cash (investments with a duration of less than 12 months)
6% - Interest rates (government or government related bonds)
53% - Company exposure (stocks, corporate bonds and private equity)
18% - Real assets (Real estate, infrastructure and TIPS)
21% - Opportunity pool (includes absolute return and distressed debt)
The allocation includes real return mandates, a new asset allocation for the Permanent Fund. In the Fund’s absolute return mandate, managers generally focus on publicly traded assets, such as stocks and bonds. Under a real return mandate, managers would invest in the same range of assets as the Permanent Fund. They would be required to structure their portfolios to meet a 5% real return target with a same level of risk as the full Permanent Fund portfolio."
read more: APFC
5/27/2009
Khaleej Times reports that, "Mubadala Development Company, an investment arm of the Abu Dhabi government, on Tuesday signed a deal to explore joint investment opportunities in French companies. The memorandum of understanding between Mubadala and France’s Fonds Strategique d’Investissement, or FSI, aims to set up a framework for investing in sectors that are of mutual interest to both the companies. Potential areas for investment in listed or private French companies include technology, health sciences, bio-technology and renewable energy. The MoU was signed during a visit by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to the UAE capital.
'This partnership fits into our strategy to work with leading international organisations across a range of industries to develop and operate businesses that not only generate outstanding financial returns but also contribute to the economic diversification of Abu Dhabi and bring real and lasting benefits to its people,' said Mubadala CEO and Managing Director Khaldoon Khalifa Al Mubarak."
read more: Khaleej Times
5/27/2009
Reuters reports that, "The Singapore government will help nurture local companies compete in international markets, but will not force its sovereign wealth fund Temasek to finance them as suggested by some legislators, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong told parliament on Wednesday.
'Government wants to help companies grow, is trying many ways and is willing to do more,' Lee said. 'But we don't believe that this can be done by the government by simply pouring money, or creating a 'Temasek II,' he said.
His remarks were in response to ideas floated by two members of parliament on Tuesday that Temasek could make a greater difference to the island-state by helping home-grown enterprises expand regionally and globally. The government has come under fire from citizens and lawmakers over losses at Temasek, in particular its ill-timed exit from Bank of America which resulted in a loss of over $3 billion."
read more: Reuters
5/22/2009
Take advantage today and gain insightful intelligence
Due to high demand, we are releasing some of our statistical and qualitative research for a reasonable price to our commercial audience. Major Sovereign Wealth Fund Real Estate Transactions - 2000-2008 is the ultimate review on past sovereign wealth fund real estate transactions. View over 70+ significant profiles of Sovereign Wealth Fund Real Estate transactions occurring from 2000-2008. It includes up to date statistics, information, commentary, and analysis on these comprehensive sovereign real estate deals.
Some topics covered include:
Real Estate Transaction Summary
Real Estate Transaction Details
Largest Buyers of Real Estate
Geographic Analysis & Commentary by Area and Region
Much more
to purchase: Major Sovereign Wealth Fund Real Estate Transactions - 2000-2008
5/22/2009
StatoilHydro ASA, Norway’s biggest oil company, plans to double U.S. production by the end of this year as new platforms begin pumping crude in the Gulf of Mexico. Oil and natural-gas output in the country will climb to the equivalent of about 60,000 barrels of crude a day from about 30,000 now, said Oivind Reinertsen, president of StatoilHydro’s U.S. and Mexico operations.
The company, which spent about $11 billion to re-establish a U.S. presence after returning to the country in 2005, targets 100,000 barrels of oil a day by 2012. The main drivers of this year’s increase are two deepwater Gulf projects: Tahiti, which started producing this month, and Thunder Hawk, which is scheduled to go online in the current quarter.
read more: Bloomberg
5/20/2009
Asian Investor states, "NBIM received approval as a qualified foreign institutional investor (QFII) from the China Securities Regulatory Commission in October 2007 and now runs a fund worth roughly $200 million in China. The Shanghai office is also responsible for maintaining the fund's Asia-Pacific portfolio, which as at end 2008, represented 16.2% of NBIM's equity investments and 5.8% of its fixed-income portfolio.
Now NBIM wants to add an investment manager to head up its global technology, media and telecom, or TMT, portfolio to be based in Shanghai. There are also openings for a new CIO, COO, chief risk officer, as well as chief treasurer in its London and Oslo headquarters."
read more: Asian Investor
5/19/2009
Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, who in 1998 criticized Hong Kong’s central bank for purchasing $15 billion in stocks during the Asian financial crisis, now calls it a savvy move. “It turned out that his timing was exquisite,” Greenspan said, referring to Joseph Yam, who plans to retire Oct. 1 after 16 years as chief executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority.
“It was a risky action, but he pulled it off,” as share prices rose for several years, the former Fed chief said in a telephone interview today. “I wouldn’t recommend that as a general rule for central banks.” Yam, 60, bought the shares 11 years ago in a successful effort to defend Hong Kong’s dollar. Greenspan told the House Banking Committee in September 1998 that the strategy would fail and erode “some of the extraordinary credibility” of the HKMA.
read more: Bloomberg
5/18/2009
 
Reuters reports that, "the Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC) said on Tuesday it plans to continue holding its stakes in Citigroup and UBS.
'GIC is a long-term investor and will continue with its investments in Citigroup and UBS,' a GIC spokeswoman told Reuters.
Some analysts had expressed concerns GIC and other sovereign funds might follow in the footsteps of Temasek, which sold off its 3 percent stake in Bank of America in the first quarter to realise a hefty loss of at least $3 billion."
read more: Reuters
5/18/2009
China is stockpiling commodities such as copper and iron ore as part of a reallocation of its sovereign wealth amid concern that the value of its dollar assets may decline, according to the Royal Bank of Canada. “It’s part of an overall desire to decrease its exposure to dollar assets,” said Brian Jackson, senior strategist at Royal Bank of Canada in Hong Kong, in an interview today. China fears the hundreds of billions of dollars the U.S. is spending on bank bailouts and stimulus will cause “higher inflation and a weaker dollar,” he said.
Premier Wen Jiabao has said he is “worried” about the safety of the nation’s $767.9 billion in holdings of U.S. Treasuries and called on the U.S. “to guarantee the safety of China’s assets.” Central bank Governor Zhou Xiaochuan has proposed a new global currency to reduce reliance on the dollar.
read more: Bloomberg
5/15/2009
Reuters reports that, "OPEC oil exporter Kuwait is looking to raise its stake in the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China(ICBC) and invest in Chinese energy and industrial sectors, its finance minister said on Friday. Speaking to Reuters on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum at the Dead Sea in Jordan, Mustapha al-Shamali also said the world's fourth-largest oil exporter would not reduce its dollar-denominated assets. Kuwait is home to one of the world's largest sovereign wealth funds, the Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA).
'We have an investment in ICBC. We have a portion of it and we are going to enlarge it,' Shamali said in an interview, without disclosing the size of the stake.
'We could get our share from the market,' he said."
read more: Reuters
5/15/2009
Bloomberg reports that, "Temasek Holdings Pte, a Singapore state-owned investment company that bought stakes in Merrill Lynch & Co. and Barclays Plc amid the global financial crisis, has sold its stake in Bank of America Corp. Temasek had received shares in Bank of America after the U.S. bank bought Merrill Lynch & Co. The investment company had paid about $5.9 billion for a 14 percent stake in Merrill Lynch.
'We have divested our shares in Bank of America,' Temasek said in an e-mailed response to Bloomberg News queries."
read more: Bloomberg
5/13/2009
According to the Wall Street Journal, "Libya's sovereign-wealth fund may take a minority stake in Enel SpA as part of the Italian utility's planned capital increase, according to Enel's chief executive and Libya's ambassador to Italy. In an interview, Enel CEO Fulvio Conti said the Libyan Investment Authority had recently expressed interest in taking a minority stake in the Italian utility. The fund could either buy shares in the open market or subscribe to an €8 billion ($10.9 billion) capital increase that Enel is planning in order to cut its debt load, Mr. Conti said.
'We would welcome their ideas. It is premature to say how much and if and when they would participate,' Mr. Conti said.
Mr. Conti has been making the rounds with investors in recent weeks to drum up support for the capital increase. A week ago, the executive traveled to Libya to make a presentation about Enel to Abdulhafid Zlitni, head of the LIA, said Hafed Gaddur, Libya's ambassador to Italy."
read more: Wall Street Journal
5/11/2009
According to the Business Standard, "the finance ministry and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has asked the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) to examine whether a proposal by Temasek Holdings and Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC) to increase their stakes in ICICI Bank would trigger the takeover code under which they would have to make an open offer to buy an additional 20%. The Singapore government has sought clarification on a proposal for the two companies to increase their stakes in ICICI Bank to 20 per cent, each holding 10 per cent. This would collectively make them the largest shareholders in the country’s largest private bank. Currently, Life Insurance Corporate is the single largest shareholder with 9.38%. The two Singapore investment vehicles currently hold 10.3 per cent in the bank — Temasek 8 per cent and GIC 2.3 per cent.
Sebi is yet to take a final view on the issue, sources said. The issue hinges on whether the two entities should be treated as one entity or not."
read more: Business Standard
5/10/2009
 
Dubai-based private-equity firm Abraaj Capital may take a minority stake in NASDAQ Dubai-listed DP World, in a vote of confidence for the Middle East's largest port operator, according to people familiar with the deal. Dubai World, which owns a 77% stake in DP World, said early Sunday that it's "engaged in discussions with a regional private equity firm which may or may not result in a transaction regarding a minority stake in DP World, coming largely from the free float."
Two government officials familiar with the negotiations who declined to be identified told Zawya Dow Jones Sunday that Abraaj was in talks with Dubai World about taking a stake in the port operator. "Abraaj submitted an offer and is in talks with the decision makers on the deal," said a government official, who declined to be identified. According to the official, this covers an initial proposal that may be followed by a formal financial offer. The interest of Abraaj in DP World will boost the operator, which has built a global network of ports including terminals in the U.K., China and Africa to add to Jebel Ali, the Middle East's largest commercial port facility.
read more: THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
5/7/2009
Shares of China Construction Bank Corporation rose as much as 7.4% Thursday on reports China's US$ 200 billion sovereign-wealth fund may scoop up part of Bank of America Corp.'s (BAC) stake in the Chinese lender.
China Construction Bank was up 3.2% at HK$4.90 at the midday break on Hong Kong's stock market, having risen as high as HK$5.10 in the morning session. The benchmark Hang Seng Index was up 0.8% at 16,967.
read more: THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
5/7/2009
According to Reuters, "Brazil will not tap a new sovereign wealth fund for key investment projects this year even though the economy may miss an official 2 percent growth forecast, Planning Minister Paulo Bernardo said on Wednesday.
'It is more likely that we use (the sovereign wealth fund) next year but we still haven't defined this. This year we will not use it,' Bernardo told the Reuters Latin American Investment Summit in Brasilia, Brazil's capital.
The fund was created last year and was originally aimed to help finance the expansion of Brazilian companies abroad."
read more: Reuters
5/4/2009
According to Reuters, "State-owned holding company Dubai World said on Sunday its African unit was investing in a wildlife game reserve in Zimbabwe as part of plans to boost its investments in Africa. Dubai World Africa, which in March said it bought three top-end South African wildlife game parks, has been pursuing investments that boost its exposure to Africa's tourism sector, including investments in hotels and beach resorts.
'(Africa) is a place where you can see growth... double-digit growth,' Dubai World Chairman Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem told the Arabian Hotel Investment Conference."
read more: Reuters
5/1/2009
The New Zealand Herald states, "Prime Minister John Key has revealed China's US$200 billion ($349 billion) sovereign-wealth fund has signaled its interest in a stake in NZ dairy giant Fonterra if it changes its capital structure. China Investment Corp chief executive Lou Jiwei made the fund's interest in Fonterra, and other New Zealand assets, clear in a meeting with Key at the Boao Forum for Asia two weeks ago.
But Key stressed it was up to Fonterra's farmer shareholders to resolve the appropriate capital structure. Sources told the Herald Key's preference would be for the NZ Superannuation Fund - rather than another nation's wealth fund - to take a stake in Fonterra. The Prime Minister has made clear to Chinese investors that New Zealand would welcome increased investment particularly in greenfields or co-ventures. Key also met a representative from the Canadian suitor for Auckland International Airport whose successful bid for a 40 per cent stake was overturned when Labour Cabinet ministers changed the overseas investment rules."
read more: New Zealand Herald
5/1/2009
The press release states, "Occidental Petroleum Corporation and Mubadala Development Company (Mubadala), through its business unit Mubadala Oil & Gas, announced today that they have signed a Development and Production Sharing Agreement (DPSA) with the National Oil and Gas Authority of Bahrain (NOGA) for the further development of the Bahrain Field. Under this agreement, a Joint Operating Company will be formed to serve as operator for the project under the DPSA.
Oxy will hold a 48-percent interest in the DPSA, with Mubadala holding a 32-percent interest and a subsidiary of NOGA holding the remaining 20 percent.
'We are pleased to expand upon our existing relationship with Abu Dhabi and look forward to working with Bahrain on this exciting project,' said Dr. Ray R. Irani, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Occidental. 'Signing this DPSA is another important step in the implementation of our growth strategy in the Middle East, and the further development of the Bahrain Field will create significant value for the people of Bahrain and for our shareholders.'"
read more: Press Release
4/29/2009
The press release states, "ever since our inception in 2007, CIC’s management team has been committed to improving our corporate governance and investment strategy. Over the past year, we have developed a sound investment management system and a strong professional team.
CIC has recently reorganized its investment departments to further improve corporate efficiency, and boost its synergized ability to seize investment opportunities and maximize benefits for its shareholder.
Based on needs and requirements of their different asset classes, target markets, investment approaches, compliance and other factors, CIC has established four new departments, i.e. Public Market Investment Department, Tactical Investment Department, Private Market Investment Department and Special Investments Department, to replace Fixed Income Investment, Equity Investment and Alternative Investment departments."
read more: CIC
4/28/2009
According to Reuters, "Kuwait's finance minister expressed confidence in the Gulf Arab state's sovereign wealth fund investment in U.S. bank Citigroup, saying in remarks published on Tuesday that it could turn profitable.
'Our investment in Citi... is beneficial... and God willing we will reach a stage where it becomes profitable,' Mustapha al-Shamali told al-Rai newspaper.
The Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA), which manages state assets in the world's fourth-biggest oil exporter, has come under fire from some parliamentarians for investing $5 billion last year in U.S. banks Citigroup and Merrill Lynch has since been bought by Bank of America."
read more: Reuters
4/27/2009
VNS states that "state equity in former State-owned enterprises that have been equitised remains poorly managed due to the overlapping authority of ministries and provincial governments, State Capital Investment Corporation deputy director Le Song Lai told a conference last week on management of state assets.
'Even in equitised firms, ministries and provincial authorities still intervene in management, which undermines corporate governance and results in a lack of professionalism and accountability,' Lai said.
The authorized representative of State capital in many of these enterprises has not been identified, said Tran Tien Cuong, director of the enterprise policy research department of Central Institute for Economic Management, with the result that a number of agencies, organisations and individuals were involved simultaneously in exercising State ownership rights. Too often, these agencies were exercising rights that, in fact, belonged to another agency, Cuong said."
read more: VNS
4/27/2009
AFP reports that, " China called Sunday for reform of the global currency system, dominated by the dollar, which it said is the root cause of the global financial crisis.
'We should attach great importance to reform of the international monetary system,' Chinese Vice Finance Minister Li Yong told the spring IMF/World Bank Development Committee meeting in Washington.
A 'flawed international monetary system is the institutional root cause of the crisis and a major defect in the current international economic governance structure,' Li said, according to a statement.
'Accordingly, we should improve the regulatory mechanism for reserve currency issuance, maintain the relative stability of exchange rates of major reserve currencies and promote a diverse and sound international currency system.'
As the world's main reserve currency, US dollars account for most governments' foreign exchange reserves and are used to set international market prices for oil, gold and other currencies. As the issuer of the key reserve currency, the United States also pays less for products and can borrow more easily. Li did not name the dollar but in late March the People's Bank of China Governor Zhou Xiaochuan said he wanted to replace the US unit which has served as the world's reserve currency since World War II."
read more: AFP
4/24/2009
Some highlights of the report state, "Also included in the Annual Report is detailed information about Mubadala’s financial performance for the calendar year 2008 - a period of rapid business development. Mubadala’s total assets grew from AED39 billion in 2007 to more than AED54 billion by the end of 2008, representing an increase of 40 percent over the previous year. The company also saw sharp increases in revenues, up by more than 370 percent to AED6.7 billion compared to AED1.8 billion for 2007.
The strong performance was offset by the company’s cautious approach to the valuation of some investments as a result of the decline in Global stock-markets (the S&P 500 Index of leading stocks fell by more than 38% in 2008) and oil prices (which halved between January and December 2008, and ended the year more than two thirds down from their peak in July). This resulted in impairment charges for 2008 of AED8.8 billion spread across a wide variety of publicly and privately held investments in the USA and other markets and contributed to a loss of AED11.8 billion in 2008 against a profit of AED1.3 billion the year before."
read more: Mubadala
4/23/2009
An investment fund run by the Persian Gulf state of Qatar says it sold 35 million shares in Barclays, cutting its stake in the British bank to 5.8 percent.
It says it sold the shares as part of a "volatility-driven portfolio management strategy." Qatar Holding is the main investment arm of the Qatar Investment Authority, the oil and natural gas-rich sheikdom's sovereign wealth fund. The holding company says it now holds 487.8 million shares in Barclays. That stake will rise by 326.2 million shares once it converts other investments it owns by the end of June.
read more: Forbes
4/17/2009
Subscribe Today
 |
Due to strong demand from our large institutional customers:
 |
4/14/2009
Wall Street Journal reports, "The lower house of the Brazilian Congress on Tuesday night approved legislation making an existing Sovereign Wealth Fund into a permanent fixture. The Chamber of Deputies voted 274-102 to approve a government bill making the fund permanent and approving an initial total for it of 14.2 billion Brazilian reals ($6.5 billion). The Sovereign Wealth Fund was created late last year by Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva by a temporary executive order. For the fund to become permanent it requires congressional approval. Following Tuesday's Chamber of Deputies vote, the bill will move on to the Brazilian Senate, where approval is also expected.
The Sovereign Wealth Fund is equal to approximately 0.5% of Brazil's gross domestic product. The idea behind it is to create and maintain the fund from public revenues during periods of economic growth. Money locked up in the fund can then be spent during periods of economic downturn.
Currently, Brazil is facing the prospect of zero economic growth in 2009 after posting an expansion of 5.1% in 2008. So far, the administration of President Lula has not indicated any intention of unlocking the Sovereign Wealth Fund for spending this year. However, many economists and business leaders have said the government should spend some of the fund's money in order to stimulate Brazil's economy. "
read more: Wall Street Journal
4/11/2009
Bloomberg reports, "China’s foreign-exchange reserves, the world’s biggest, had their smallest gain in eight years as exports slumped and the slowing economy deterred investment from abroad. Foreign-currency holdings rose about $7.7 billion in the first quarter to $1.9537 trillion, the People’s Bank of China said today on its Web site. That was the smallest increase since the second quarter of 2001 and compares with a $40 billion jump in the fourth quarter.
China’s first-quarter trade surplus shrank 45 percent from the previous three months and foreign direct investment tumbled as the global recession choked off demand. Slower growth in the reserves may limit Chinese purchases of U.S. Treasuries just as the Obama administration seeks to sell record amounts of debt to fund a $787 billion stimulus package."
read more: Bloomberg
4/8/2009
Reuters reports, "Britain would welcome investments by sovereign wealth funds to bolster its economy, Business Secretary Peter Mandelson said on Wednesday. Gulf-based investment firms have poured billions of dollars in recent years into businesses ranging from Western banks and stock exchanges to sports clubs and circus troupes. Britain's economy will shrink by 3.7 percent this year, its fastest pace of decline since World War Two, and the government has little room for more fiscal support, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development said last week.
'Yes, I have met sovereign wealth funds,' Mandelson told reporters in Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates, without giving further specifics.
'We welcome sovereign wealth fund investments, unlike some other countries that are hesitant, and we strongly encourage investments from the UAE and others into Britain.
We need liquidity in the system, we need funds to flow, we need credit to flow,' Mandelson said."
read more: Reuters
4/8/2009
The companies – Standard Life Investments, Aberdeen Asset Management and Martin Currie – are close to signing a deal after a review of more than 400 fund managers that applied for licenses from the China Investment Corporation (CIC) in early 2008. Sources said that the three British companies were among 20-25 international investment houses that will be granted a mixture of global equity and fixed-income licenses by the CIC. The value of the licenses has not been disclosed but the source said they earn the winners more than £100m in some cases.
read more: The Telegraph
4/3/2009
Investment transparency is a concern for many governments and sovereign wealth funds. The Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute has noticed that many sovereign wealth funds are beginning to take steps to increase their transparency in recent months. The Alaska Permanent Fund is leading the way in investment transparency. They are one of the first sovereign wealth funds that publicly list their real estate holdings.
Sample Real Estate Investment Profile
120 East 87th Street: Retail
120 East 87th Street
New York, NY
Initial Investment Date: Feb 28, 1995
Percent Ownership: 100
Manager: L&B Realty Advisors, LLP
120 East 87th Street is a retail condominium comprised of portions of the first two floors and basement of a 14-story midrise residential condominium building. It has 78,024 square feet of leasable space and is located in an affluent area of New York.
source: Alaska Permanent Fund
read more: APFC - RE Holdings
4/2/2009
Caijing reports that, "Central Huijin Investment Ltd., an arm of sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corp, will buy a 38% stake in New China Life Insurance Co. from the China Insurance Regulatory Commission (CIRC).
A person close to shareholders of New China Life, China’s fifth-largest insurer, told Caijing that the acquisition was approved by the State Council, China’s cabinet. The person added that the acquisition price will be set after Pricewaterhouse Coopers finishes its audit of New China Life’s 2008 accounts.
Central Huijin is a controlling shareholder in several Chinese financial institutions and is often called upon to restructure those in poor shape. The CIRC took 38 percent in New China Life following a 2007 investigation into alleged fund misuse at the insurer. It paid 2.7 billion yuan, or 5.99 yuan per share for its stake in the unlisted company."
read more: Caijing
4/1/2009
Press release states "Today I approve the application by Hunan Valin Iron and Steel Group for up to a 17.55 per cent shareholding in Fortescue Metals Group, subject to the formal and strict undertakings I have sought from Hunan Valin, and which have also been agreed to by Fortescue Metals Group.
These undertakings are as follows:
Any person nominated by Hunan Valin to Fortescue's board will comply with the Director's Code of Conduct maintained by Fortescue;
Any person nominated by Hunan Valin to Fortescue's board will submit a standing notice under the Corporations Act 2001 of their potential conflict of interest relating to Fortescue's marketing, sales, customer profiles, price setting and cost structures for pricing and shipping; and
Hunan Valin and any person nominated by it to Fortescue's board will comply with the information segregation arrangements agreed between Fortescue and Hunan Valin.
Hunan Valin will report to FIRB on its compliance with these undertakings. These undertakings ensure consistency with Australia's national interest principles for investments by foreign government entities, which I set out in February 2008. They ensure the appropriate separation of Fortescue's commercial operations and customer interests, and support the market-based development of Australia's resources.
Penalties for non-compliance with these undertakings are contained in the Corporations Act 2001 and breaches of the Code of Conduct can lead to the director's removal from the company board.
I note Fortescue's involvement in negotiating the above arrangements, and its responsibility to its shareholders for enforcement of the company's Directors' Code of Conduct.
Under the proposal, Fortescue has agreed to issue new shares to Hunan Valin to raise funds for the next expansion phase of its iron ore mining operations in the Pilbara. Hunan Valin also intends to acquire some shares from other shareholders. Consistent with this approval and with its agreement with Fortescue, Hunan Valin will not hold above 17.55 per cent in total. It is on these bases that I have approved the acquisition under the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act 1975."
read more: Press Release - Australia - Treasurer
3/31/2009
Reuters reports that, "The Russian central bank does not expect any decisions on a new global currency any time soon with the dollar remaining the main reserve unit, First Deputy Chairman of the central bank Alexei Ulyukayev said on Friday.
Reserve holders China and Russia sparked a heated debate ahead of the G20 summit in London next week proposing to use the International Monetary Fund's Special Drawing Rights as a new global reserve currency.
'This is a very lengthy process... For a very long time the dollar will stay the reserve currency used for both private and state investment, including by central banks and sovereign wealth funds,' Ulyukayev told Echo Moskvy radio station."
read more: Reuters
3/29/2009
Dubai World Sunday welcomed a last-minute $200 million payment by MGM Mirage (MGM) for the CityCenter project in Las Vegas as a "sign of good faith", but warned it was a temporary solution to the liquidity problems the casino operator is facing.
MGM Mirage made a $200 million payment due Friday to its City Center project, including the $100 million owed by Dubai World, to keep the massive resort and casino project from halting construction and potentially falling into bankruptcy.
"Dubai World appreciates the support of MGM Mirage's bank group and the CityCenter joint venture's bank group in providing a waiver to its client that allows this payment," the investment company, which is owned by the emirate's government, said in an emailed statement.
"It is as an acceptable, albeit temporary, solution to the liquidity issues that MGM Mirage is facing, which are at the heart of the lawsuit filed in Delaware earlier this week," it said.
Last week, Infinity World - a subsidiary of Dubai World - sued MGM, alleging that the troubled casino operator breached the terms of their venture. MGM has said the suit is "completely without merit." Dubai World has blamed MGM for massive cost overruns on City Center. Earlier this month, MGM reported it swung to a fourth-quarter net loss on a $1.2 billion write-down, and the company said it saw weakness in gaming and the economy in general in the first quarter.
read more: WSJ
3/27/2009
Norway - Government Pension Fund – Global is one of the most transparent sovereign wealth funds in the world. The sovereign wealth fund is a shareholder in more then 7,900 firms that span the globe. They are trying to expose themselves toward emerging markets.
The fund’s ownership of global equity markets rose to 0.77%.
Inflows of capital into the fund were record-high at NOK 384 billion and invested entirely in global equity markets
The return on the fund was -23.3% in international currency, the weakest result in the fund’s history.
Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM) is making significant changes to its investment strategy in order to make better use of the fund’s size and long-term investment horizon.
read more: Ebook-GPF
3/25/2009
Telegraph states, "Shirin Ismail, head of absolute returns investment strategies at Temasek’s standalone unit Fullerton Fund Management, told the Reuters Private Equity and Hedge Funds Summit in Singapore: 'This is an area we will add on because this is where we think it will give us that level of capital preservation that we need.'
Hedge fund withdrawals reached a record $159bn (£110bn) last year, according to Lipper, a unit of Thomson Reuters. Some commentators have predicted that as many as half of existing hedge fund managers could shut this year. However, the industry’s supporters argue that in a period of falling stock markets investors need the more sophisticated strategies hedge funds offer. "
read more: Telegraph
3/24/2009
Zhou Xiaochuan writes, "the outbreak of the current crisis and its spillover in the world have confronted us with a long-existing but still unanswered question,i.e., what kind of international reserve currency do we need to secure global financial stability and facilitate world economic growth, which was one of the purposes for establishing the IMF? There were various institutional arrangements in an attempt to find a solution, including the Silver Standard, the Gold Standard, the Gold Exchange Standard and the Bretton Woods system. The above question, however, as the ongoing financial crisis demonstrates, is far from being solved, and has become even more severe due to the inherent weaknesses of the current international monetary system.
Theoretically, an international reserve currency should first be anchored to a stable benchmark and issued according to a clear set of rules, therefore to ensure orderly supply; second, its supply should be flexible enough to allow timely adjustment according to the changing demand; third, such adjustments should be disconnected from economic conditions and sovereign interests of any single country. The acceptance of credit-based national currencies as major international reserve currencies, as is the case in the current system, is a rare special case in history. The crisis again calls for creative reform of the existing international monetary system towards an international reserve currency with a stable value, rule-based issuance and manageable supply, so as to achieve the objective of safeguarding global economic and financial stability."
read more: Paper: Reform the International Monetary System
read more: People's Bank of China
3/24/2009
Zawya states, "Saudi Arabia's ruler, King Abdullah, Monday approved the creation of a new sovereign wealth fund that will oversee the assets of the oil-rich kingdom's largest pension fund, according to a statement.
The new fund, to be called the Hassana Investment Co. Hassana Investment Co. will invest in real estate and commercial projects, and stock markets in the Middle East and overseas, according to the statement on the official Saudi Press Agency Web site. Its mandate will be to manage the assets of the General Organization for Social Insurance, or GOSI, the agency said. The creation of the new fund is a departure in strategy by Saudi Arabia, which has previously channeled most of its overseas assets through its central bank the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, or SAMA. The authority is thought to control assets worth around $500 billion mostly in treasuries.
Saudi's pension fund holds sizable positions in dozens of locally listed companies. Among these investments are a 9.9% stake worth 7.5 billion Saudi riyals ($2 billion) in Al Rajhi Bank and 11.2% of Etihad Etisalat Co., a mobile telecom operator, which is worth about SAR2.5 billion, according to Monday's closing prices. The fund also owns a number of real estate projects around the kingdom. Analysts estimate that GOSI has around $400 billion in total assets, mostly in the kingdom. Hassana which roughly translates to "protector," is fully owned by GOSI. The government didn't disclose the amount of assets the new company will manage."
read more: Zawya
3/19/2009
Subscribe to the Sovereign Wealth Quarterly between March 19, 2009 and April 19, 2009 and receive the Q4Y2008 report for FREE.
Preview Article Q4Y08: Sovereign Wealth Funds and Sustainable Investment (interview with Dr. Matthew J. Kiernan)
The world of global investment is now in the early stages of a transformation more profound than anything it has witnessed in literally decades. There is a powerful, worldwide trend among major institutional investors to incorporate “sustainability” or “ESG” (environmental, social, and governance) concerns – notably climate change – into their global investment strategies.
One of the Prime Minister’s goals was to attract gulf investment into the UK. The benefit for Qatar’s fund is that the UK government pledges to transfer technology to the Gulf state. It is a win for Qatar as they want to diversify their industries from oil and gas, especially with the down market on energy...........
Preview Article Q4Y08: £ 250 Million Joint Clean-Energy Investment Fund is created by Qatar and the United Kingdom
The parties have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). The Country of Qatar and the UK agreed to establish a £250 million fund to pay for the development of technologies that help produce low-carbon-emitting energy. The UK Carbon Trust which was set up by the UK Government in 2001 is pledging £10 million plus a commitment to attract private capital worth around £90 million. UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown toured the Persian Gulf...........
read more: subscribe today
3/19/2009
3/17/2009
Korea Investment Corp., the $24.8 billion South Korean sovereign wealth fund, has hired a Tudor Investment Corp veteran to serve as its chief investment officer. Scott Kalb, who had worked for Tudor and other asset management firms, will replace former CIO Guan Ong on April 1, Reuters reports. Kalb was also a managing director at Citigroup's Smith Barney International Asset Management. KIC manages part of the country's foreign currency reserves on behalf of the Bank of Korea and assets of the finance ministry. With the South Korean government planning to increase the asset size of KIC to $50 billion by 2010, a revised law, pending at parliament, will allow the wealth fund to buy domestic stocks and other assets. It invested $2 billion in Merrill Lynch early last year before it was bought by Bank of America, which has reportedly translated into heavy losses.
read more: FINalternatives
3/14/2009
To view: Zawya
3/13/2009
The NY Times reports that ,"the Chinese premier Wen Jiabao expressed concern on Friday about the safety of China’s $1 trillion investment in American government debt, the world’s largest such holding, and urged the Obama administration to provide assurances that its investment would keep its value in the face of a global financial crisis.
The Chinese premier Wen Jiabao spoke at a news conference on Thursday at the end of the Chinese parliament’s annual session.
Speaking at a news conference at the end of the Chinese parliament’s annual session, Mr. Wen said he was worried about China’s holdings of Treasury bonds and other debt, and that China was watching United States economic developments closely.
'President Obama and his new government have adopted a series of measures to deal with the financial crisis. We have expectations as to the effects of these measures,' Mr. Wen said. 'We have lent a huge amount of money to the U.S. Of course we are concerned about the safety of our assets. To be honest, I am definitely a little worried.'"
read more: NY Times
3/12/2009
The Guardian reports that, "Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, one of the world's largest investors, has put buying on hold for the next six months and will then focus more on energy and commodities in a major strategic overhaul.
'For the next six months we will do nothing,' said Hussein al-Abdullah, executive director of the Qatar Investment Authority, a sovereign wealth fund with assets recently estimated to total $60 billion.
'Beginning in the second half of the year, we will review our strategy. The sectors we will focus more on are commodities, food, energy and water because it is an important sector and the prices will pick up,' he told reporters on Thursday on the sidelines of a conference in Dubai. Sitting on up to $4 trillion in assets, much of it from selling oil and other raw materials, most SWFs have been conservative in their investment choices, holding dollars, treasuries and shares in large U.S. and European companies."
read more: Guardian
3/11/2009
"It's now a "good opportunity" for the China Investment Corp. (CIC), China's sovereign wealth fund, to make international investment, said a top CIC official here Wednesday.
'To some extent, the current international situation gives the CIC a good opportunity,' said CIC deputy general manager Wang Jianxi, who is also a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the top political advisory body.
'The major concern is when and how we should take actions,' said Wang during a panel discussion of the CPPCC National Committee's annual session.
As a passive financial investor, the CIC will stick to its initial purpose of increasing the investment proceeds of China's foreign exchange reserves and "adjust its investment strategies according to market conditions," said Wang."
read more: Xinhua
3/10/2009
Reuters reports that, "Qatar has asked its sovereign wealth fund to buy local banks' investment portfolios to boost liquidity and encourage lending, a finance ministry official said on Tuesday.
The Gulf Arab oil and gas exporter said on Monday it will buy the portfolios without saying how much it had allocated to carry out the programme, which sent stocks soaring.
'The main goal of this measure is to provide the necessary liquidity to the banks in order to facilitate lending,' Khalaf al-Mannai, undersecretary for the finance and economy ministry told Reuters in a telephone interview."
read more: Reuters
3/4/2009
read more: Linaburg-Maduell Transparency Index
3/2/2009
According to Venture Beat, "Fisker Automotive, maker of a luxury plug-in hybrid vehicle called the Karma, has squeezed an additional $3 million out of its private investors, bringing its total capital raised to more than $100 million — a staggering feat considering the state of the credit market. The Irvine, Calif. company raked in $65 million in September but says the recent addition to its third round is just the right amount to put finishing touches on the Karma before it rolls into showrooms.
The $3 million addition came from Quantum Fuel Systems Technologies, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Al Gharrafa Investment, Palo Alto Investors and Thomas Lloyd Capital. Qatar Investment Authority joined existing investors in the $65 million tranche in the fall."
read more: Venture Beat
3/1/2009
Abu Dhabi is assessing its $7.5 billion investment in Citigroup as the bank's problems deepen and consequences of a possible nationalization become clearer, according to sources close to the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA). ADIA invested $7.5 billon last year in Citi through convertible bonds that pay 11 percent in interest, but it must start converting the bonds into 235.6 million shares in Citigroup from March next year. "Nothing has changed from ADIA's perspective at this point. ADIA's convertible bonds are due for conversion in a phased manner between March 2010 and September 2011, and that stands," an Abu Dhabi government official told Reuters.
read more: Reuters
2/26/2009
France's sovereign wealth fund on Wednesday announced it had taken a stake in French auto parts group Valeo, a firm that has been targeted by a New York investment group pushing for a merger. The FSI said it's taken an 8.3% stake in Valeo and has 10.55% of the voting rights.
New York-based Pardus Capital Management, Valeo's top shareholder, has suggested the French firm merge with Visteon a rival auto parts maker in which Pardus also is the leading shareholder.
read more: MarketWatch
2/24/2009
According to Temasek, "Temasek Holdings Advisors India Pvt. Ltd (Temasek) has announced the expansion of its India operations with the launch of its Chennai branch office. While Temasek enjoys a strong presence in the North and the West, the Chennai office represents a strategic geographical diversification to focus on the large South India market, providing an ideal base from which to penetrate the untapped areas in the South. Temasek commenced its India operations in 2004 with the establishment of its Mumbai office."
read more: Temasek Holdings Press Release
2/23/2009
Apax Partners has secured deals to sell holdings in its management company to two Asian-Pacific investors after protracted discussions with three parties. The sale should buttress the private-equity firm at a time when fund-raising is at a low and portfolio valuations are coming under pressure.
GIC Special Investments, the private-equity arm of sovereign-wealth fund Government of Singapore Investment Corp., and the A$59.6 billion Australian national retirement plan, Future Fund, took less than 10% of Apax’s management company. A potential third party, believed to be a Japanese investor, has used corporate vehicle CN Advisory to express its interest in joining Apax’s membership–-the formal way of owning a stake in the firm that is a limited liability partnership.
In a statement, Future Fund said the deal involved investors purchasing a stake of “around 10%” of the Apax Partners management company and performance fees, called carried interest, in Apax’s funds. The undisclosed net proceeds of Apax selling a stake were being reinvested in a permanent capital vehicle in which Future Fund would have a 10% stake and would have a principal objective to invest in future Apax funds.
read more: The Wall Street Journal
2/19/2009
Reuters reports that "the Japanese government will waive the tax on the interest accrued on sovereign wealth funds' holdings in the country, the Nikkei business newspaper reported on its web site. Overseas investors generally face a 15 percent tax on interest income. Investors from countries with which Japan has bilateral tax accords are imposed a lower tax of 5 to 10 percent. The report said that for sovereign funds of treaty partners, Japan plans to exempt the interest from bond holdings, deposits and loans. Both corporate and government bonds will be covered by the exemption, but not stock dividends. Nikkei also said Japan has already reached a basic agreement on a tax treaty with Kuwait, while negotiations are ongoing with the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia."
read more: Reuters
2/18/2009
The Financial Times reports that, "Sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East are growing increasingly concerned about the health of the US Treasury market, raising questions about whether they will remain such active buyers of US government debt. Middle Eastern buyers are the fifth-largest investors in Treasuries after China, Japan, the UK and Caribbean banking centres, and their appetite could prove critical to US government plans to issue mountains of debt to fund stimulus efforts. So far there is little sign of a flight from the dollar or from Treasuries, but senior executives at several sovereign funds in the region say the US Treasury has been conducting a dialogue to reassure Middle Eastern investors that US government debt still offers value."
read more: Financial Times
2/16/2009
The Independent reports that, "Norway's sovereign wealth fund is on the verge of an $18 billion (£12.5bn) shopping spree for landmark British and American properties. Norges Bank, Norway's central bank, which manages investments made from Norway's vast energy surplus, is understood to be ready to make its first investments by the end of the summer. Paul Golding, the former Merrill Lynch banker who heads the fund's UK arm, had been expected to start investing money for the fund last year. However Norges needed approval from the country's government, which was not forthcoming during the financial crisis last year. Mr Golding's three-man investment team is understood to have stepped up talks with property advisers in recent months ahead of getting the needed permission. Norges is likely to invest as a minority stakeholder in landmark buildings in both the UK and US while prices are low. If this proves successful, it will continue to invest in other markets."
read more: The Independent
2/13/2009
Sources: BP Statistical Review of World Energy June 2008, Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute
2/13/2009
Reuters states, "Libya's sovereign wealth fund controls assets of more than $65 billion but has only up to 23 percent of its available cash funneled into investments, the fund's chairman said on Thursday.
The Libyan Investment Authority is one of several highly secretive investment funds owned by national governments that have become increasingly active in buying up Western assets, flush with cash from high oil prices in previous years.
The Libyan fund had a positive albeit small return on investment in 2008, after enjoying roughly a 15 percent return on investment in 2007, said Chairman Abdulhafid Zlitni.
'We're very liquid,' Zlitni, who is also Libya's planning minister, told reporters at a dinner in Rome in his honour that attracted the top brass of Italian business including Mediobanca Chairman Cesare Geronzi and UniCredit CEO Alessandro Profumo.
'And when you have cash now, you're king.'"
read more: Reuters
2/12/2009
According to Reuters, "Indonesia's fifth-largest lender, PT Bank Danamon Tbk, said on Thursday it plans to exercise its option to buy back $300 million of subordinated bonds as it has sufficient funds. Danamon, controlled by a consortium that includes Singapore's state investor Temasek and Deutsche Bank, said its net profit for 2008 fell 28 percent to 1.53 trillion rupiah ($129.5 million), from 2.117 trillion rupiah in 2007. The bank said the drop in profit was due to 804 billion rupiah worth of non-recurring expenses, which it said were related to unwinding foreign exchange forward contracts and provisioning."
read more: Reuters
2/11/2009
Singapore and Kuwait are reporting billions of dollars in losses to their sovereign wealth funds in the latest symptom of the global economic crisis.
The Singapore state investment firm Temasek Holdings says the value of its investments plunged about 31 percent to $81 billion between March and November of last year.
Temasek has invested heavily in troubled banking companies, including U.S.-based Merrill Lynch and Britain's Barclays.
Kuwait's sovereign wealth fund also has taken a big hit from the credit crisis. A Kuwaiti lawmaker, Walid al-Tabtabai, says the oil-rich country has lost about $31 billion of its estimated $300-billion fund.
read more: VOA News
2/6/2009
According to the press release, "the Board of Directors of Temasek Holdings (Private) Limited Temasek today announced a leadership transition – Mr Charles Chip W. Goodyear will succeed Ms Ho Ching as Chief Executive to lead the Singapore investment company.
Mr Goodyear, 51, an American, joined the Temasek Board on 1 February. He assumes the position of CEO-Designate on 1 March and will succeed Ms Ho on 1 October 2009. Mr Goodyear retired from BHP Billiton on 1 January 2008 after leading the world’s largest diversified resources company through its rapid growth and expansion.
The appointment and leadership transition will further strengthen Temasek’s Board and management. The Board, including Ms Ho, has been addressing succession planning annually since early 2005.
Temasek Chairman, Mr Dhanabalan said, 'Ho Ching has been instrumental in bringing Chip on board. We have been working on this appointment for more than a year.'
Mr Dhanabalan added that Mr Goodyear shares the vision and values that underpin Temasek as a key Singapore institution and an international investment company. 'Chip presents a rare and unusual combination of investment and operational experience that can support the continued transformation of Temasek,' he said.
'Chip’s leadership and business experience, and his demonstrated capability in developing strong management teams give us the confidence that he will make a difference to Temasek just as Ho Ching and her predecessors have done over the last three decades.'
Ms Ho and Temasek’s management helped shape the Singapore company into a respected international investor."
read more: Temasek Press Release
2/6/2009
According to the press release the, "first acquisition in Asian market to trigger further investment in the region over the long term. International property investment and development company St Martins has made its first move into the Asian market by acquiring a luxury 27-storey high rise residential tower in central Tokyo for JPY 13 billion (£105 million), with a net yield above the historic average for such a quality property.
Nigel Brown, Managing Director at St Martins, said: 'This is the first of what we anticipate will be a number of investments in the region, subject to pricing and timing.'
He continued: 'Whilst we have been considering investment opportunities throughout Asia, including China, Hong Kong, Singapore Vietnam and Australia, our future Asian strategy is likely to focus on Japan, China and Australia. We are waiting for the right opportunities at the right prices that will offer potential for long term performance and represent properties that aren't normally seen coming to the market.'
'Whilst we will continue to review the markets, and specific opportunities, we consider that it may be later in the year before similar quality assets become available at attractive prices and any signs of recovery are seen in the markets. We anticipate a correction in the pricing in China to make investments more attractive in comparison for instance to yields now available in the UK and other developed markets. St Martins will also consider landmark opportunities in the major cities in Continental Europe and the UK when the markets become more stable.'"
read more: St. Martin Press Release
2/3/2009
According to the press release, "South African Deputy Foreign Minister Sue van der Merwe will hold the first round of bilateral consultations with the Assistant Foreign Minister for Follow-Up Affairs of the State of Qatar Mr Mohammed Abdullah Al-Rumaihi at the Twelve Apostles Hotel and Spa in Camps Bay, Cape Town on Wednesday 04 February 2009.
Qatar Investment in South Africa and Africa
The Qatar Investment Authority has invested US$400 million in an investment fund, the PME Infrastructure Management Limited Fund. The fund is investing in infrastructure in Africa and is concentrating on the areas of transportation, communication and energy. According to the Government of Qatar, South Africa is the biggest beneficiary and of this fund which is considered to be the first investment by the Qatar Investment Authority in South Africa.
South African Investments in Qatar
South African companies have been fairly successful in obtaining contracts for major projects in Qatar. Sasol and Qatar Petroleum entered into a US$900 million joint venture gas-to-liquid facility at Ras Lafan. The plant was inaugurated on 6 June 2006 by the Minister of Minerals and Energy Bulelwa Sonjica."
read more: South Africa - Department of Foreign Affairs
2/2/2009
Sovereign wealth funds are taking some of the biggest hits during the latest round of economic uncertainty. CNBC's Maria Bartiromo spoke with Sheik Hamad Al-Thani, Qatar's prime minister and CEO of the country's largest investment authority.
watch here: CNBC
1/30/2009
According to the website, "Tony Tan Keng-Yam, Deputy Chairman and Executive Director, Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC), Singapore, said there would likely be a shake-out in the financial system into two tiers: first, a core of tightly regulated, large commercial banks working with lower levels of leverage than in the past; second, a group of “quasi banks” (private equity, hedge funds, etc.) with a different regulatory structure from commercial banks and no access to the central banks. Investment banks would probably come somewhere in-between, he said. It was normal that governments had intervened to prop up confidence. Now the question was how they would extract themselves in a way that provides incentives to shareholders, who will be necessary for a strong banking sector in the future. He also warned of the dangers of over-regulation stifling creativity."
read more: World Economic Forum
1/29/2009
Legg Mason has reported results for 3Q of FY 2009. The report states, "AUM decreased to $698.2 billion at December 31, 2008, down $300.3 billion, or 30%, from December 31, 2007 and down $143.7 billion, or 17%, from $841.9 billion at September 30, 2008. In the third quarter of fiscal 2009, net client cash outflows were $77.0 billion. Equity outflows were approximately $17 billion, fixed income outflows were approximately $42 billion and liquidity outflows were approximately $18 billion in the quarter, the latter primarily driven by a partial redemption by a sovereign wealth fund with operating needs."
read more: Legg Mason Press Release
1/28/2009
The Times reports that, "The head of one of the world's leading sovereign wealth funds said at Davos today that there were bargains to be had but it was too early to make major long-term purchases as the global financial crisis was going to get worse. Asset prices were at very reasonable levels but it was still to early to make big bets on long-term investments, said Sameer al-Ansari, the chief executive of the $13 billion Dubai International Capital. Speaking on the sidelines of the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, Mr al-Ansari said that the sovereign fund could see opportunities but remained nervous of markets as the financial system was broken.
'There (is) going to be a great opportunity in the next year or two to acquire assets at historically unprecedented levels,' said Mr al-Ansari.
'The region has to invest for the long term... choosing assets that represent good value for the region.'
However, he added: 'We’re still very nervous about making some big bets - we see the financial crisis getting worse. There’s not going to be a magic wand solution to the problem. The system as we know it is literally broken. We have to get money flowing again, we have to get liquidity flowing again, we have to get confidence back. That’s going to take time, that’s going to take two, three, four years. In the meantime the world is going to (get) poorer, standards of living are going to get worse and it’s not going to be pleasant.'"
read more: Times
1/26/2009
Kuwait Investment Authority, the oil-exporter's sovereign wealth fund, will own 16 percent in troubled Gulf Bank after the lender completed its capital hike, an official said on Monday. In December, shareholders in Gulf Bank approved a rescue plan ordered by the central bank to raise 375 million dinars (936.6 million pounds) in a 100 percent emergency rights issue to cover derivatives losses of the same amount. Under the rescue plan worked out by the government, the KIA was to buy up any remaining stock from the capital increase, which it will offer later to nationals in a public offering.
read more: UK Reuters
1/26/2009
According to the Economic Times, "The finance ministry has proposed that a key agreement between India and Singapore be amended to prevent two Singapore
government-owned investment entities — Temasek and GIC — from together holding more than 10% equity stake in any publicly-traded Indian company.
Under the current SEBI regulations, a foreign institutional investor (FII) cannot hold more than 10% in a single Indian company. Different FIIs owned by a common entity are classified as an FII group and are subject to the 10% cap. GIC and nine wholly-owned subsidiaries of Temasek are registered separately with the market regulator as FIIs, and as they have a common owner, they should have been categorized as an FII group, according to a note prepared by the ministry.
However, the Comprehensive Economic Co-operation Agreement (CECA) signed between the two countries in 2005 treats GIC and Temasek as unrelated and independent entities. It gave Temasek and GIC the right to hold 10% individually in a single company thereby allowing them the option to together increase their shareholding to up to 20% in a company."
read more: Reuters
1/25/2009
Reuters reports that, "The Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA), the Gulf Arab state's sovereign wealth fund, has reduced exposure to global stock markets since October, shifting assets instead into short-term cash funds, a government report said. In a briefing to parliament, the government said KIA had cut the ratio of international share investments in a key fund in a bid to minimize the effect of the global financial crisis on Kuwait, the world's seventh-largest oil exporter, according to a copy of the report obtained by Reuters on Sunday. The news comes after KIA, which manages Kuwait's substantial oil-generated assets, last year burned its fingers by buying into U.S. banks such as Citigroup and Merrill Lynch before both stocks nosedived and the latter filed for bankruptcy protection.
KIA, which like other sovereign wealth funds does not disclose its investment policy, had come under fire in parliament for making those investments."
read more: Reuters
1/23/2009
Dow Jones reports that, "The latest fund was at $12.5 billion in April with the majority of that amount collected in 2007. The vehicle raised $3 billion between the end of 2007 and April. That meant that Apollo was also somewhat sheltered from the market tumult following the Lehman Brothers Holdings’s bankruptcy in September, which took overall private equity fund-raising into a more severe slowdown. The majority of capital for the vehicle was raised before that event as Apollo had closed on $14 billion as of August.
Limited partners in the new fund include Teacher Retirement System of Texas, California Public Employees’ Retirement System, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Kuwait Investment Authority, Los Angeles City Employees’ Retirement System, Oregon State Treasury, Louisiana State Employees’ Retirement System, San Francisco Employees’ Retirement System, Portfolio Advisors LLC, Santa Barbara County Employees’ Retirement System, San Bernardino County Employees’ Retirement Association, New Mexico Educational Retirement Board and Los Angeles Fire and Police Pensions."
read more: Dow Jones Private Equity Analyst
1/21/2009
The National states, "General Electric (GE), the US-based technology services conglomerate, will be the first tenant of Masdar’s carbon-free city being built on the outskirts of Abu Dhabi. The partnership, announced by Masdar yesterday, follows the signing last July of a strategic partnership between GE and Mubadala, the investment company behind Masdar."
read more: The National
1/20/2009
Reuters reports that, "Singapore's sovereign wealth funds, the Government of Singapore Investment Corp and Temasek Holdings, outperformed global equity markets in 2008, the city-state's finance minister said on Monday.
'Their overall value has fallen by less than the decline in global equity markets, as they maintain diversified portfolios and had taken precautionary actions early in the crisis to reduce their exposures to the equity markets,' Tharman Shanmugaratnam said in a reply to a parliamentary question, referring to a 42 percent fall in 2008 in the MSCI World equities index."
read more: Reuters
1/17/2009
Reuters reports that, "Kuwait's sovereign wealth fund does not plan to reduce its overseas investments despite launching a 1.5 billion dinar ($5.17 billion) fund to invest in local stock markets, the finance minister said.
'We won't lower foreign investment,' Mustapha al-Shamali told Reuters on the sidelines of an Arab economic meeting in Kuwait, when asked whether the Kuwait Investment Authority would scale back its foreign activities.
KIA, which manages the Gulf state's massive oil-generated assets, has invested around the globe and last year bought into U.S. banks such as Citigroup Inc.
In December, it launched on behalf of the government a fund to stabilise the second-largest Arab bourse .KWSE, which fell 38 percent last year during a regional stock market rout triggered by the global financial crisis."
read more: Reuters
1/15/2009
Below are some notable transactions by SWFs making direct purchases.
1/14/2009
The Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation Board of Trustees hired State Street Global Asset Managers for a $700 million passive global mandate on January 14. The mandate was previously managed by UBS Global Managers. During the teleconferenced meeting, the Board also took the following action:
Amended the APFC’s equity investments resolution to include the Morgan Stanley Capital World Index as the benchmark for global passive managers.
Transferred the distressed debt portfolio managed by Crestline Investors, Inc. from domestic fixed income to the absolute return strategies asset class. The Trustees determined that the portfolio’s characteristics made it more naturally fit in the alternative assets portfolio.
Changed the short-term interest rate proxy for CDs purchased through APFC’s Alaska CD program from U.S. Treasury Bills to the short-term rate published by the Federal Home Loan Bank of Seattle. This ensures that the Permanent Fund is receiving fair compensation for its investment, while providing liquidity to the Alaskan economy through the state’s banking system.
read more: Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation
1/11/2009
Subscribe Today
 |
Due to strong demand from our large institutional customers:
|
1/11/2009
The State-run Libyan Investment Authority will disclose details about its investment strategy in coming months to allay concerns in the U.S. and European about its intentions, the fund's Executive Director Mohamed Layas said Sunday.
The Libyan state investment vehicle, or sovereign wealth fund, will also open a London office this year after months of consideration and is eyeing investments in some distressed banking and real estate assets in the U.S. and Europe, Layas said, declining to provide specifics. "We will soon publish a report soon about our investments and intentions. We will show our purpose to be transparent and that we are a long-term investor," Layas told Dow Jones Newswires in an interview by telephone from the Libyan capital, Tripoli. He declined to provide any details about what type of investment principles the LIA will commit to and said the report could be disclosed before spring.
By laying out its investment philosophy in some form, the LIA wants to assure lawmakers in foreign countries its intentions are purely commercial and not for political advantage, said Layas, a former chairman of the Libyan Arab Foreign Bank.
"Any deals we pursue will be about commerce only," he said.
The LIA currently has about $70 billion on hand to deploy, Layas said, up from around $40 billion when the fund was launched in late 2007 with the aim of investing big chunks of the North African oil-rich nation's growing cash pile from record crude prices into overseas assets. Government-controlled investment funds have snapped up foreign companies in recent years, sparking calls in the U.S. and Europe for more transparency about the funds' purposes.
read more: Easy Bourse
1/8/2009
It states: "The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority said today that it has appointed Bill Schwab as Global Head of Real Estate, based in Abu Dhabi, with immediate effect.
Mr. Schwab, 56, will be responsible for leading a dedicated team of professionals in managing and implementing ADIA’s global investment strategy in the real estate sector. He joins from J.P. Morgan, where he was a Managing Director in the European Real Estate Finance division with responsibility for the origination and execution of real estate transactions. Prior to this, Mr. Schwab spent 5 years at Deutsche Bank as a Director in the Real Estate, Capital Structure & Underwriting department. He also previously served as Chief Lending Officer in the Real Estate division at Goldman Sachs and held a number of senior posts within the real estate and construction industries.
Commenting on the appointment, Majed Al Romaithi, Executive Director for Real Estate at ADIA, said: 'Bill is a highly regarded professional with broad knowledge and experience across all aspects of the real estate business and we are delighted to welcome him to the ADIA team. He will play an important role in guiding ADIA’s investment strategy in this exciting and constantly evolving sector.'
Mr. Schwab said: 'ADIA has an excellent reputation as an established and sophisticated real estate investor with a focus on sustainable, long term returns. I am very excited to be working with such a high caliber team and contributing to ADIA’s continued success in the real estate space.'"
read more: ADIA Press Release
1/7/2009
It states: "The Chilean government unveiled an ambitious countercyclical fiscal strategy to stimulate employment and growth in 2009. The plan involves over US$4 billion, equivalent to 2.8% of GDP. The stimulus plan announced by President Michelle Bachelet aims at securing economic growth between 2 and 3% in 2009 and encouraging employment. The government estimates that the plan could create over 100 thousand jobs. The package involves direct support for low-income families, additional public investment in infrastructure, tax cuts and other incentives for private investment, enhanced access to financing by small and medium companies, additional funds for labor retraining and a new hiring incentive, among other initiatives. The changes will be contained in a bill to be sent to Congress this week, and in several administrative measures that do not require congressional approval.
The plan contemplates an increase in public sector outlays of 1% of GDP (US$1,485 million), so that the 2009 real increase in public expenditure will reach 10,7%. The fiscal spending increase has as a counterpart an increase in structural fiscal income (owing to the depreciation of the Chilean peso, which raises the value of fiscal income denominated in dollars) and a temporary reduction in 2009 of the structural fiscal surplus to 0% of GDP from 0.5%. The plan also involves a temporary reduction in tax revenues of US$1,455 million, or 1% of GDP in 2009. Because they are transitory, the tax reductions do not affect structural, long term, fiscal revenues. Additionally, the government will allocate resources to capitalize Codelco and to fund CORFO financing initiatives. These items do not constitute additional spending, but rather below-the-line acquisitions of financial assets.
This fiscal strategy will imply an effective fiscal deficit of 2.9% of GDP in 2009. The government reaffirmed its strict adherence to the structural fiscal balance approach, which has strengthened public finances and allowed for the application of a strongly counter-cyclical fiscal policy. The plan will be financed with resources from the Economic and Social Stabilization Fund and the issuance of bonds authorized by the 2009 Budget Law."
read more: Chile - Ministry of Finance
1/7/2009
According to the Press Release by AMD, "AMD and the Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC) announced today that they had obtained clearance from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States ("CFIUS") regarding the creation of The Foundry Company, their leading-edge semiconductor manufacturing joint venture. CFIUS also has determined that the proposed additional investment in AMD by Mubadala is not a covered transaction subject to CFIUS review."
read more: AMD Press Release
1/6/2009
According to the Wall Street Journal, "Dow Chemical Co. said it would pursue legal, operational and financial avenues to enforce its rights under a failed $17.4 billion joint-venture deal with Kuwait's Petrochemical Industries Inc.
At the same time, Dow said that it has been approached by other potential business partners and that it has been in discussions regarding some of the operations that were slated to be part of the Kuwait deal, such as the basic plastics business that was its centerpiece.
The Midland, Mich., chemicals giant was notified Dec. 31 that Petrochemical Industries was scuttling their K-Dow venture just days before its launch."
read more: Wall Street Journal
1/4/2009
Reuters reports that, "a Kuwait government fund launched to stabilise the Gulf state's bourse was seeking long-term investments in stocks, the managing director of the Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA) said on Sunday.
In November, Kuwait asked its sovereign wealth fund KIA to set up the fund to shore up the second largest Arab bourse , which fell 38 percent last year during a regional stock market rout triggered by the global financial crisis.
The fund, which started operations on Dec. 24, was seeking long-term investments, Bader al-Saad said at a news conference on Sunday.
Kuwaiti Minister of Finance Mustapha al-Shamali said last month the fund would invest least 1.5 billion dinars ($5.42 billion)."
read more: Reuters
1/2/2009
The Norwegian SWF is administered by Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), a division of the Norwegian Central Bank.
According to the Press Release by Norges Bank, "the Fund’s foreign exchange requirements are partly met by the state’s direct financial interest in petroleum activities (SDFI) and partly by Norges Bank’s purchases in the market.
The Ministry of Finance determines the size of the monthly allocations to the Fund. Norges Bank’s purchases of foreign exchange are equal to the difference between the allocations and the SDFI’s estimated foreign exchange revenues. Adjustments are made for any revisions of estimates for the previous month. As a result, the daily purchases may vary from one month to the next. The daily foreign exchange purchases are determined for a period of one month at a time and are published on the last business day of the preceding month."
read more: Norges Bank
1/2/2009
A long-term SR720 million financing agreement was signed here by Jubail Energy Services Company (JESCO), a subsidiary of the Industrialization and Energy Services Company (TAQA), and the Public Investment Fund (PIF), a state-owned organisation established by a royal decree to provide finance to commercial ventures.
The funds will be used to finance part of the seamless pipe manufacturing facility being built in the industrial city of Jubail.
Hamad bin Mohammed Al Kanhal, JESCO’s board member, who signed the agreement on behalf of JESCO’s President Khalil Al Gannas, in Riyadh said that the company owns and develops all technical, financial and human capabilities required to secure a leadership position in this specialised global manufacturing sector. He added that TAQA owns 51 percent of JESCO, while the balance of the company’s share capital is owned by Saudi and foreign investors.
read more: Khaleej Times
We provide consultant & advisory services to the following types of clients:
Investment Managers
White Papers, SWF Asset Allocation, Marketing Strategies, Investor Analysis, & More
Sovereign Wealth Funds
Sovereign Wealth Fund Development, Sovereign Wealth Fund Procedures & Mechanisms, Economic & Feasibility Analysis, Public Relations, Transparency Analysis, Asset Allocation, External Manager Programs & Selection, Sovereign Wealth Peer Analysis, Risk Management, Performance Monitoring
Governments & NGOs
White Papers, Political Analysis, Policy Development
If you are interested in our consulting & advisory services, please email consulting@swfinstitute.org
All consulting projects & engagements are subject to a 15% retainer fee; however, Sovereign Wealth Funds, Public Pension Funds, and Government Agencies are exempt. All client work is CONFIDENTIAL, unless permitted.
|
|
