[Weekly Wrap] How does Huljich's pricing strategy work?

This week has had a bit of everything in it in terms of news. Perhaps the most startling story is today's one on Good Returns where Huljich explains its rather unusual pricing strategy.

Friday, February 19th 2010, 2:55PM 1 Comment

The story started in one of the Sunday papers which suggested some assets were sold into the Huljich funds at rather favourable prices, which had the effect of skewering performance. I must admit, when I first read the story I wondered if it was a beat-up.

Clearly not, judging by comments Peter Huljich made late last night. What is fascinating is the circumstances around why assets were transferred into the funds.

Sticking with investment issues, we report on PIMCO's views on fixed interest investing in this market. It says now is the time to go active. Clearly they differed from some earlier comments. The report from PIMCO is worth a read if fixed interest is your thing.

Another fixed interest story is one over in Depositrates.co.nz. Yesterday the government responded to the Capital Markets Taskforce and said it would like to investigate issuing more debt products into the market and also resuming the issue of inflation indexed bonds.

The response to the report has got me thinking about how the government gets Kiwis to invest in markets other than property. More on that soon.

Finance companies continue to attract plenty of headlines. S&P released three ratings this week (Fisher and Paykel Finance, PGG Wrightson Finance and Manchester Unity). Also KPMG put out its latest report on the non-bank deposit takers and South Canterbury commented on its liquidity issues.

Our two regulation stories this week are around the IFA seeking an exemption from the proposed training requirements put up by the Code Committee. Also there is a bit of manouvering going on over how the bigger companies may try and tie advisers into their distribution networks through QFEs.

Meanwhile, competition to educate advisers is stepping up with TNP rolling out its school.

During the week we have had results from AMP and AXA. We look at AXA's performance in the risk market and how it has increased its sales through the non-aligned channels (rather than AXA aligned ones). Later today we will report on how AMP has been getting on. In case you are wondering, yes, AMP is still interested in bidding for AXA, although its initial approach was turned down.

The mortgage world has been a little quiet, however some of the smaller banks have reduced rates. In Broker News we have a story about a new service designed to help people shift banks. Find out how here.

We have a couple of appointments this week. One is a new adviser at Macquarie. The other is changes to the boards of Perpetual and MARAC. Details here.

Have a great weekend.

Philip

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Comments from our readers

On 22 February 2010 at 7:29 am Independent Observer said:

I don't know Peter Huljich (so this is not a personal attack against him or his organisation) - however I strongly beleive that the loose regulations that surrounds the provision of Kiwisaver services make them them vulnerable targets to replace the stigma of our recent finance company experiences.

It seems that industry participants and observers are currently cavalier about kiwisaver exposures, which have relatively miniscule sums. These will quickly become more significant amounts, whereby the loss to individuals and the credibility of the industry will grow in significance as many operators buckly under adminstrative, operations and market pressures.

The industry (and those who claim to be regulators of the industry) needs to be proactive in their assessments of Kiwisaver schemes, and must act swiftly to ensure that future nest eggs are not lost.