HSBC Global Asset Management Taiwan Ltd (匯豐中華投信) is to grow local operations by expanding its management team and launching new funds by the end of this year, chief executive officer Chiao Hsin (焦訢) told a news conference in Taipei yesterday.
The asset management company has about 80 employees, and it would add five senior managers who would be in charge of portfolios and projects, Chiao said.
“The positions would be offered to local talent. We are already interviewing some candidates. It is possible that the positions would be filled in the third quarter,” Chiao said.
Photo: CNA
While it is uncommon for local asset management companies to expand their senior management teams, HSBC Global Asset Taiwan has been committed to deepening its local operations, she said.
The company would also ask for more resources from its parent company to enhance staff training, investment research, risk controls and product design to boost business in the local fund market, Chiao said.
“We have discussed with our overseas investment team the design of a new onshore fund that we plan to launch by the end of this year. We can bring a global perspective in fund design, as HSBC is an international group,” Chiao said.
The company would factor in rate hikes and inflation when it chooses investment targets, as both are expected to persist over the next few years, Chiao said.
The new fund would also have environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) factors, and would comply with tighter rules that were announced by regulators in January, Chiao said.
While regulators have not specified the types of companies in which ESG-themed funds must not invest, HSBC Global Asset Taiwan would not invest in companies that make tobacco products or alcoholic beverages, or run gambling operations, she said.
“Besides those companies, we will not specifically select industries, as a company in an energy-consuming field could still perform well in ESG,” Chiao said.
MORE RESISTANT
ESG funds are more resistant to risks than other types of funds, as the companies that are chosen by such funds usually have two properties — great scale of operations and good cash flow, Chiao said.
The company has introduced 23 offshore funds to local investors, all of which meet the European Supervisory Authorities’ Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulations, Chiao said.
Eight of the funds conform with Article 8 of the regulations, as the companies they invest follow good governance practices and can be called “light green funds,” she said.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
RSS