Products May 31, 2011

Operational Risk Firm Established

Steven Harding, formerly of Independent Fiduciary Services (IFS), has started P2E Consulting Group LLC.
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Harding was a Senior Vice President and Managing Director at IFS, a registered investment adviser (RIA). His new firm, P2E Consulting Group, specializes in operational risk management, including: audit committee consulting; board self-evaluation and educational workshops; enterprise risk management (ERM); internal audit co-sourcing; investment manager reviews; operational reviews; and internal audit quality assessment reviews (QAR).  

Harding joined IFS in 1999, and has headed up the operational review practice since 2008.  

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The new firm’s Web site is http://www.p2eco.com.
In Practice May 31, 2011

Transitioning Assets A Slow Process, Consultant Says

Institutional investors are taking more time to change investment managers or asset allocations than they did before the 2008 financial crisis, according to Mellon Transition Management (MTM).
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“Since the financial crisis began in 2008, we have seen institutions take as long as a full year to complete the transitioning of their assets away from one investment manager to another after beginning their initial consultations with us,” said Mark Keleher, co-founder of MTM and its chief executive officer. “This compares with a typical period of approximately two to four weeks before the crisis began.”

MTM attributes the longer time periods to heightened compliance scrutiny across the institutional investment landscape as plan sponsors and investment managers deal with regulatory changes and governance challenges. Transition management trends that began after the financial crisis are continuing today, as institutions continue to move money away from home country equities to both longer term corporate bonds and international equities.

“Transition management has evolved significantly since we opened our doors 10 years ago,” Keleher said.  “While this service originated as a low-cost way to change asset allocations or investment managers, the focus is now much more on risk control.  Increasingly, transition assignments involve multiple asset classes, illiquid securities, global markets and derivative overlays.”

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