Author: Lily Harper

Stay informed with free updatesSimply sign up to the Fund management myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox.US public university endowments are increasing investments in private equity even as the underperforming asset class has weighed on their private college peers in recent years. Seven public university endowments told the Financial Times they were increasing allocation to PE by as much as 150 per cent over the next few years in a bid to boost long-term returns.The push into illiquid assets comes as a prolonged high interest rate environment and a slump in IPO and dealmaking has depressed PE valuation. In…

Welcome to FT Asset Management, our weekly newsletter on the movers and shakers behind a multitrillion-dollar global industry. This article is an on-site version of the newsletter. Subscribers can sign up here to get it delivered every Monday. Explore all of our newsletters here.Does the format, content and tone work for you? Let me know: harriet.agnew@ft.com One scoop to start: UK chancellor Rachel Reeves is expected to announce plans to cut the annual tax-free cash Isa allowance in her Mansion House speech later this month, in an effort to shift some of the £300bn cash pile into British companies.In today’s…

Crypto companies and traders are pouring billions of dollars into tokenised versions of money market and Treasury bond mutual funds, as they look beyond stablecoins to other places to park excess cash that can also give them some yield.Total assets held in tokenised Treasury products — which include funds whose units have been converted into digital tokens as well as some tokenised US government bonds — have jumped 80 per cent so far this year to $7.4bn, according to data group RWA.xyz. Funds run by BlackRock, Franklin Templeton and Janus Henderson have grown particularly rapidly, with combined assets tripling.Inflows have…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Liechtenstein has launched an emergency task force to tackle a crisis of “zombie” trusts, which has left hundreds of entities linked to wealthy Russians in legal paralysis.The tiny Alpine principality, a hub for thousands of trusts and foundations, has been hit by a wave of resignations by fiduciary and board directors in the past six months as its regulatory system adjusted to US sanctions packages against Russia.The result could leave as many as 800 orphaned entities — legally recognised but functionally frozen…

Seven years after BlackRock’s last big foray into private credit, last week Larry Fink finally turned the world’s largest asset manager into a player. With the completion of the $12bn takeover of HPS Investment Partners on Tuesday, the $11.6tn investment group has closed a trio of takeovers that shift it from a position of dominance in public markets to one where it straddles both public and private assets. BlackRock folded in infrastructure investment firm Global Infrastructure Partners last October and private market data provider Preqin in March. The deals are crucial to BlackRock’s success in the private investment space, widely…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Britain’s financial regulators are failing to push through vital reforms needed to unlock some £22bn in trade finance for small businesses, the UK branch of the International Chamber of Commerce has warned.In a letter to the Financial Conduct Authority and the Bank of England’s Prudential Regulation Authority, the ICC said there was an “urgent need” for reforms to regulations governing the raising of trade finance that is key to underwriting global transactions. The letter, seen by the Financial Times, warned that the “antiquated”…

Stay informed with free updatesSimply sign up to the Climate change myFT Digest — delivered directly to your inbox.John Warlters, chief executive of the charity Rural Aid, helped to unload 150 tonnes of hay in the remote Kangaroo Island off the coast of South Australia in June.It is the first time his charity has delivered fodder to the island — known as one of Australia’s leading food producing regions, specialising in honey, oysters, eggs and meat — but its farmers have struggled with a damaging drought that has hit the southern half of Australia for the past two years.“It’s exceptionally…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.PwC’s new UK boss has lined up managing partner Laura Hinton as the frontrunner to replace the head of its crucial Middle East business next year, as the Big Four firm seeks to move on from a clash with a major Saudi client.Marco Amitrano, PwC’s UK senior partner, is considering Hinton — one of his former rivals for the top job — as the lead candidate to succeed Hani Ashkar, according to people familiar with the matter. Ashkar informed colleagues in May…

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.Red flags were raised over Wood Group’s financial statements as far back as 2017, according to corporate and regulatory records that indicate persistent questions over its accounting practices.The London-listed company — which the UK’s financial markets regulator is now investigating as £242mn takeover talks languish — had to restate an income statement after being questioned over its 2022 annual report by the country’s accounting watchdog. It was the second time the Financial Reporting Council had found problems with Wood’s accounts.The energy engineering…

Investors wondering what to do with their pensions, investments and savings face an uncertain environment on various fronts as the unpredictability of Donald Trump, the US president, shakes up the markets. Equities have been volatile and the dollar has had its worst start to the year since the 1970s due to uncertainty around Trump’s tariffs and geopolitical events. Fixed income is not playing its usual “stabilising” role in a portfolio to counter inflation concerns, with some wealth managers saying they no longer believe in the traditional 60-40 model of equities versus bonds. Gold is still seen as a haven but…