Citywire Selector Podcast

Francisco Garcia Parames led Spanish family office Bestinver to be a power player in value investing. However, Parames also serves as a perfect example of how the title of ‘star manager’ can come with both pros and cons. In this podcast, we take a deep dive into the power of Parames – his performance and personality. How he evaded both the dotcom bubble and the Great Financial Crash, as well as hearing from former colleagues, commentators and experts about his acrimonious exit, his boutique venture and where his career might go next.

The 20th Chinese Communist Party Congress has not done much in the way of easing the nerves of investors or the global financial markets, with Xi Jinping packing his leadership team with loyalists, as well as not giving a clear sign as to when the country’s zero-covid policy might end. In this latest episode, Raphael Kassin shares his immediate takeaways from the congress, as well as his thoughts on the future of Chinese debt. As well as how the markets are reacting to the Brazilian elections, and why he believes the world needs to go back to logically living within its means.

Raphael Kassin and Citywire’s Krystle Higgins discuss what it would take for him to reinvest in Chinese debt, as well as why he will never back the Euro. ‘I would never put my money into Euros, because I struggle to understand how Europe functions’ In the latest episode of this series, Raphael Kassin and Citywire Selector’s Krystle Higgins discuss the latest moves by the Fed, along with what it would take for him to reinvest in China and why he will never invest in Euros.

Citywire's head of ESG and cross-border research Nisha Long and Mary Ann Sieghart, author of The Authority Gap: Why Women are Still Taken Less Seriously Than Men, and what We Can Do about it, take a closer look at the main findings. The number of women managing active mutual funds has all but ground to a halt in the past year. In this episode, Dr Nisha Long shares the report's main findings with Mary Ann Sieghart who described this year’s results ‘retrograde and depressing’. Also discussed in the episode are the myriad of small changes asset management firms can make to lessen the authority gap in the sector. The report shows the proportion of female managers has increased by just 1.7 percentage points since 2016. While men dominate launches, with just 10% of new funds being assigned to female managers.

As regulation around sustainability becomes stricter, asset managers are increasingly looking to hire staff with specialised skills, such as climate risk modelling.    In this episode of the Let’s Talk About ESG podcast, Ian Povey-Hall, global head of sustainable finance and impact investing at Acre, explains why investment firms are seeking a different kind of professional when hiring portfolio managers to run dark-green Article 9 funds. He suggests firms are distinguishing these recruits from those running similar but broader light-green Article 8 strategies.   Also in this podcast, Povey-Hall talks about what’s behind the stewardship hiring boom, as well as the challenges asset managers are facing when bringing over investment teams from rivals. 

‘I’ve changed my mind on China.’ Raphael Kassin explains why he feels cautious about a disruptive new global era, while maintaining it is time to pile into EM debt. In this episode, Kassin talks to Krystle Higgins about the latest diametrically opposing views of JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley as to whether now is the time to heavily invest in EM or take a more defensive approach. Kassin, also shares his views on how the markets would react to a Trump nomination, as well as China’s decision to restructure a portion of EM debt and what that could mean for the market at large.

Tensions between China and the US have escalated once more, as Beijing extends its military drills around Taiwan, adding more uncertainty to what has already been a rocky road for the EM markets this year. In the latest bonus EM Insider episode, EM veteran John Malloy from Redwheel talks through his position as a US based investor who is currently overweight in China, as well as his own predictions for when the fortunes of the embattled market might see better inflows. As well as where he has placed his bets, and which decisions he wished he had made faster.

Even those with a physical copy of the Swiss firm’s conflict of interest policy couldn’t believe what had happened. ‘If you lose the confidence of your clients, you lose everything’. The impact of the Tim Haywood scandal on GAM as a company was apparent, but what about investment professionals either invested with or closely monitoring the Swiss company? In the second part of our special podcast, ‘Suspension of disbelief’, fund buyers reveal what they remember about the crisis as it unfolded, how it affected their interactions with the firm and what longer term lessons they have taken from the event. We hear from Paul Gambles, co-founder of Thailand-based investment company MBMG Group, as well as portfolio manager and analyst Pierre Molinero of OFI Asset Management. For the first episode, which covered the lead-up and immediate aftermath of the crisis, click here.

Sri Lanka has declared a state of emergency amid protests following the country's recent economic crisis, which saw the president flee the country. Many are now asking whether Sri Lanka is the 'canary in the EM coal mine'. In the latest EM Insider episode, emerging market debt expert, Raphael Kassin, talks us through the lessons that investors can take from this crisis, the clues of the pending crisis which he spotted last year. As well as what he believes the long term EM winners will be this year, should rate hikes stabilise.

The suspension of Tim Haywood will go down as a landmark moment in the history of Swiss asset management firm GAM. But, what was the situation prior to the event and how have things changed in the four years since the head of its absolute return bond unit was dismissed. In this two-part series, Citywire’s Chris Sloley and Niamh Doyle recount the lead-up to the shock announcement in July 2018, what happened to the company in the immediate aftermath and also hear from international fund buyers about their experience and understanding of how things unfolded. In this first episode, we rewind the clock to uncover how GAM was functioning in the years leading up to the fateful market update, as well as casting an eye on how the Swiss group dove headlong into crisis management as its share price dropped.

PODCAST: Citywire Selector spoke at length with the GMO founder and value stalwart about his current market thinking. ‘Value tends to prosper’. As far as mantras to live by, Jeremy Grantham is very committed to the idea that buying discounted stocks and making money as they prove the doubters wrong is a way to earn a living. In this extended interview, the GMO founder outlines why he believes the latest rotation in market styles is more meaningful than some that have gone before, while also explaining why the hot pocket of recent growth - technology - might now be sitting right in his wheelhouse. Also in this discussion, we expand on previous points about alternative investing and fears over ‘super bubbles’ being driven by herd mentality, as well as his thoughts about income inequality and being one of the early proponents of climate-aware investing.

Alliance Bernstein’s Vinay Thapar talks about the incredible innovation of the medtech sector versus a slower advancement within the traditional pharmaceutical industry. In the fifth episode of its MedTech podcast, Citywire Selectors meets Vinay Thapar, fund manager at Alliance Bernstein. Thapar, who has been investing in the healthcare space for over two decades and oversees the AB International Health Care fund, talks about the long-term advantages of a thematic strategy and the two main factors that define a successful investable business. When selecting stocks, the fund manager looks at the company’s return on invested capital to determine its efficiency, while also considering the firm’s reinvestment rate. Thapar’s bottom-up investing strategy guarantees a risk-aware portfolio which benefits from the best available opportunities, which are not necessarily linked to a specific country or sub-sector. But what are the main trends and opportunities that lay ahead within the healthcare space? Thapar highli

While stressing how digitalisation has been embedded within both the medtech and the general health care space over the last few years, Blum highlights his two strategies’ overarching themes, as well as the key differences between the Bellevue Medtech & Services fund and the Bellavue Digital Health fund he oversees. American medical devices and health care producer Abbott Laboratories is one of the large caps the first fund invests in, to concurrently secure stability and growth. The Bellavue Digital Health fund, on the other hand, is mainly tilted towards exponential growth digital health companies like Shockwave Medical, which produces cardiovascular medical devices. In this episode Blum also talks about forthcoming products which are expected to drive market growth and more specifically, he is eyeing names within robotic assisted surgery, structural heart disease treatment and diabetes care. This episode was recorded on February 11 (2022).

There were two reasons Amundi’s Vincent Mortier said parts of the private markets resembled Ponzi schemes. The first is the idea of leverage is often miscommunicated and the second is that value is hard to properly ascertain. That is the view of Cyril Demaria, independent consultant and private markets expert. In this special podcast, Demaria, who has more than 20 years industry experience and was formerly CIO of private markets at UBS Wealth Management, discusses the reality of the private markets landscape today. Also in this discussion, Demaria discusses the challenge of ensuring proper outperformance in a market famed for its limited transparency and also offers his tips for being able to select a private equity fund to fit your portfolio.

During the third episode of its MedTech podcast, Citywire Selectors meets co-head of BMO GAM’s global equities team Jamie Jenkins. He talks about the challenges the MedTech sector has been facing over the last couple of years, and how those hurdles have added to long-term issues like diabetes and an ageing population. Jenkins shares details of his three-step approach which consists in avoiding companies with damaging or unsustainable business practices, while investing in names that make a positive contribution to the society, and/or the environment. Within this strategy, Jenkins and his team want to facilitate and promote best practice management of environmental, social and governance issues, through long-term ownership of companies. The co-head is also lead portfolio manager of both the BMO Responsible Global Equity fund and the BMO SDG Engagement Global Equity fund, and these strategies’ healthcare holdings contribute towards ‘health and wellbeing’, which is one of the United Nations Sustainable Develop

In the second episode of its MedTech podcast, Citywire Selectors meets Paul Loudon, investment manager at Walter Scott & Partners. Loudon, who oversees the BNY Mellon Long Term Global Equity fund, talks about his long-term, high conviction strategy and the best way to access medical technology products and companies with a long runway for growth. At the core of his approach is the aim to invest in MedTech business solutions that benefit all three key stakeholders: the patient, the health system, and the investor. Artificial heart valves & hemodynamic monitoring company Edwards Lifesciences, together with robotic surgery company Intuitive Surgical, sit at the top of the list of healthcare holdings within the fund. While the equipment produced by both companies is equally expensive and sophisticated, it provides safer and effective procedures, which make the investment worthwhile in the medium-long term. This episode was recorded on February 4 (2022).

Kicking off the series is Zehrid Osmani, head of global long-term unconstrained at Martin Currie. With a fifth of his portfolio tilted towards healthcare, Osmani achieves structural growth by focusing on areas of attraction, without letting index exposure dictate his choices. Demographic changes, resource scarcity and an exponential growth of technology across all economy sectors, are the megatrends at the hearth of his strategy. But what new areas are consolidating within the healthcare space? Genomics, which is leading the way to tailor made therapies based on everybody's genetic profile, is certainly on the list. And guess what, the cost of sequencing a genome has decreased from $54m in 2003, to just $600 at present! This episode was recorded on February 4 (2022).

If you’re making sustainability hires for marketing purposes, it will quickly become clear it’s not going to work or it won’t have a true impact on the business. When selecting funds, Anne Ackerman, former head of impact fund selection at Credit Suisse, always paid attention to interactions between portfolio managers and ESG analysts to make sure that their approach to sustainability was robust enough. ‘It is not about the number of people, CVs of those people, but more about the commitment of the business and people running the business; how they actually support sustainability experts.’ In her view it is not just about integrating sustainability into the investment process but also about the role it plays for companies themselves, be it the wellbeing of employees or how a given firm sets environmental or climate targets. 'If this is not supported at the high level – at some point there probably will be struggles, but I think it is an important aspect to look at.’ Also in this podcast former fund buy

Jeremie Banet once was a fund manager at Pimco. However, after a few years in finance, he decided that he needed to experience something more tangible. After setting up a French food truck company, which didn’t succeed, he tried to mix both worlds, returning to the US firm as lead portfolio manager of global inflation-linked bond funds. However, Banet again decided to leave asset management for good to become an academic on digital currencies and is currently a PhD student at the University of California Irvine. For the last episode of this second series of Breaking and Entering, we uncover a ‘lost tape’ from our first season, which was helmed by former Citywire Selector reporter Victoire Barbin Perron.

Brokers in Wall Street still tell stories about the time 'Queen of the Court' Regina Borromeo remained undefeated for years during her years in Manhattan. After all, to win various tennis and squash championships at university and share courts with some of the most renowned players in the world is something very few people get to do. Nevertheless, while she managed to handle both her sports and educational careers during her teenage years, Borromeo decided that going professional wasn't for her. However, she kept her passion high up in her priorities list. She competed with the Philippines team in the Asian Games in 2018 against rivals half her age, before becoming director of global macro fixed income at Robeco.