Search results for

For large integrated property developments that aim to attract communities to “live, work, play” super blocks, edge cities or lifestyle shopping and entertainment developments, careful branding and marketing are as important as capital, bricks and cement. So successful have some developers become that brands created from single projects have become exportable into other developments and even overseas.

“Take your pick as to which of these versions you prefer to believe:

Pomegranate Capital is to be the first fund of hedge funds investing entirely in funds managed by women. CEO Susan Solovay reportedly has a list of 250 hedge funds run by women and has received backing from the Safra family and Fortress. Solovay points to research showing that female investors are more likely than their male counterparts to produce consistent long-term growth, yet find it harder to raise capital.

Recent flurries in M&A in the hedge fund sector have not come out of the blue, says Ted Gooden, partner at M&A adviser to financial companies Berkshire Capital, and more are to be expected in 2007.

Turkey’s banks survived a full-blown crisis this year, but they retain a high risk profile, according to a report by Standard & Poor’s.

The Chilean government is poised to back a fundamental reform of the country’s celebrated private pensions system so that domestic banks can administer their own pension funds for the first time.

Europe might well see its first CRE CDO by the end of the year (see Real estate CDOs: One size fits all?, Euromoney, October 2006). Blackrock Financial Management has structured a €342.5 million deal backed by predominantly UK and German CMBS tranches and B notes with an average rating of single B/single B plus. As the first of its kind, the CRE CDO was always going to be conservatively structured, and Blackrock is indeed taking a large chunk of equity – nearly 18%. As investors become more familiar with this asset class perhaps leverage levels will rise. But this first deal, lead managed by Morgan Stanley, will be closely watched as a blueprint for how this busy US sector might transfer to Europe.

Increased competition on cost between European exchanges might lead to liquidity fragmentation. Is there a solution to this?

How much CPDO volume can be produced before it starts to affect the market of which it is a derivative?

First there was Pop Idol, then American Idol, and now what amounts to Internship Idol.

But proposed exchange believes it will not harm plans to bring new volumes and efficiencies to the forex market.

Asia’s property pioneers