Showing posts with label SJ Asset Management. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SJ Asset Management. Show all posts

Friday 22 June 2012

Investor's Checklist: Asset Management and Insurance

Look for diversity in asset management companies.  Firms that manage a number of asset classes - such as stocks, bonds, and hedge funds - are more stable during market gyrations.  One-hit wonders are much more volatile and are subject to wild swings.

Keep an eye on asset growth.  Make sure an asset manager is successful in consistently bringing in inflows greater than outflows.

Look for money managers with attractive niche markets, such as tax-managed funds or international investing.

Sticky assets add stability.  Look for firms with a high percentage of stable assets, such as institutional money managers or fund firms who specialize in retirement savings.

Bigger is often better.  Firms with more assets, longer track records, and multiple asset classes have much more to offer finicky customers.

Be wary of any insurance firm that grows faster than the industry average (unless the growth can be explained by acquisitions).

One of the best ways to protect against investment risk in the life insurance world is to consider companies with diversified revenue bases.  Some products, such as variable annuities, have exhibited a good degree of cyclicality.

Look for life insurers with high credit ratings (AA) and a consistent ability to realise ROEs above their cost of capital.

Seek out property/casualty insurers who consistently achieve ROEs above 15 percent.  This is a good indication of underwriting discipline and cost control.

Avoid insurers who take repeated reserving charges.  This often indicates pricing below cost or deteriorating cost inflation.

Look for management teams committed to building shareholder value.  These teams often have significant personal wealth invested in the businesses they run.



Ref:  The Five Rules for Successful Stock Investing by Pat Dorsey


Read also:
Investor's Checklist: A Guided Tour of the Market...




Monday 2 August 2010

How to grow rich stealing super cash

How to grow rich stealing super cash
August 2, 2010

I propose a new push to educate industrious individuals looking at money-making opportunities in the $1.3 trillion Australian superannuation industry. I'm writing, of course, about organised criminals.

Given the rich range of opportunities available to rip-off superannuation money, I think it only fair the Australian Securities and Investments Commission provide a level playing field for the ne'er-do-wells by fully disclosing the loopholes.

Through a program of financial education, the commission can give these individuals what they want and indeed deserve from the current settings - a free ride with your superannuation cash.

As a handy guide for the commission, I propose any education program cover the following areas:

FINANCIAL SERVICES LICENCES

Criminal background? Dodgy past? Ownership of a financial services licensee is no problem.

How so? The commission does not apply a good-fame-and-character test to the owner of a company granted a financial services licence, but applies it to the directors.

BusinessDay exposed just such a situation this year when it reported on Jeffrey Revell-Reade who owned OzGroup, involved in managing super worth $600 million. Revell-Reade had been repeatedly named in relation to international penny stock scams.

All a person with a dubious past need do is own a company, appoint relatively clean-skin directors with some financial experience, and away you go - a financial services licence to play with.

Incidentally, even if the owner directly controls the financial services licensee, the commission doesn't say boo publicly. For example, companies controlled by a Hong Kong businessman Jack Flader, a central figure in the disappearance of $123 million in Trio Capital money, appointed two new directors to his financial planning business in June. The commission said this was not a problem.

PRODUCT DISCLOSURE STATEMENTS

If you are of a certain inclination you definitely do not want to tell investors exactly what you plan to do with their money.

Fortunately, the commission has, in my view, a track record of letting through misleading material that can be used to garner funds.

In the case of Trio Capital, the product disclosure statements for Astarra Strategic were revealed to be meaningless to the point of laughable.

In evidence to a liquidator's examination, the 24 years of investment experience referred to in Astarra Strategic's disclosure statement consisted of Shawn Richard, who described his qualifications as an office boy, and his less talented companion, Eugene Liu.

And away you go, harvesting $123 million in investments sent to an overseas company without another word.

Astarra is not an isolated case. I am aware of another product disclosure statement out there that does not name the investment manager.

Where is the money going? Who is placing it? The investor doesn't know. Neither does the commission. Pretty handy, hey?

CONFLICTS OF INTEREST

Fortunately for the criminally-minded, there are few legal obligations that effectively pick up conflicts of interest for those running superannuation funds.

Those patient enough can winkle their way into controlling all three elements within a superannuation fund: the administrator, the trustee and the investment manager.

In Trio Capital, all three became owned by the same enterprise, so the cash could be directed offshore without question.

Interestingly, large investment managers, such as AMP and Westpac, use exactly the same system.

Current practice means Bear Stearns could have set up in Australia in 2007 the You Beaut All You Can Eat CDO Superannuation Fund.

So this isn't just an education program for criminals; big corporations that act irresponsibly can get a leg up with this particular loophole.

FINANCIAL PLANNERS

Of course, your criminal enterprise needs a distribution network. And who better than a group of salespeople handsomely rewarded for selling your product?

Current settings allow all kinds of secret commissions to financial planning networks.

With Trio Capital, an $840,000 secret commission was paid by the investment manager to the Wollongong financial planner Tarrants that it happily called a "marketing allowance". These kinds of payments are due to be banned under the Bowen reforms. Fortunately for crims, there are still opportunities to use financial planners for their own ends. This rests in the ease with which planners and entire businesses can become "authorised representatives" of a financial services licensee.

The commission has no say about these "authorised representatives".

It does not check their credentials in any way. Instead it relies on financial services licensees to check the competence and integrity of their authorised reps.

Ahem. See point one.

BREAK THE LAW

Put a bit of spit and polish on the curriculum vitae. Even tell a few lies in your Australian Financial Services Licence application; the commission doesn't appear to look too hard.

And there you have it. Put in place the above steps and grab the money.

There is a lot of superannuation money. It has attracted a lot of interest of the wrong sort.

By rights the commission should be acting to fix these problems.

But until that time, the crims are free to use all the pointers outlined above.

In fact, they already have.

Source: The Sydney Morning Herald

http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/how-to-grow-rich-stealing-super-cash-20100801-111ir.html

Friday 30 July 2010

SC revokes SJ Asset Mgmt licence

SC revokes SJ Asset Mgmt licence


Written by Joseph Chin
Wednesday, 28 July 2010 20:56


KUALA LUMPUR: The Securities Commission has revoked SJ Asset Management Sdn Bhd's (SJAM) licence to undertake fund management activities.

The SC said on Wednesday, July 28 that the move, which took immediate effect, came after the SC found that SJAM breached regulatory requirements in relation to the safeguarding of clients' assets and the company had engaged in deceitful and improper business practices.

"The SC also found that SJAM had furnished false and misleading information and documents to the regulator.

"The SC is working closely with the police and regulatory counterparts in other countries as part of its investigations into the affairs of SJAM," said the SC in a statement posted on its website.

The SC said that it had on Tuesday, petitioned to the High Court for the winding up of SJAM.

It said the winding-up of SJAM will enable liquidators to effectively deal with the rights and entitlements of all creditors including the clients of SJAM. The liquidators would also determine an appropriate basis of returning the clients assets to the entitled clients.


http://www.theedgemalaysia.com/business-news/170769-sc-revokes-sj-asset-mgmt-licence.html


Read also: http://whereiszemoola.blogspot.com/2010/07/some-comments-on-sj-asset-managements.html


Comment:

It takes 30 years to build a reputation and only 5 minutes to destroy one.
It is extremely difficult to have total absolute trust in anybody when it comes to your money.
Be very careful and wary always.

Thursday 8 July 2010

CIMB monitoring SJAM

Thursday July 8, 2010

CIMB monitoring SJAM



KUALA LUMPUR: CIMB Group Holdings Bhd is monitoring the situation at SJ Asset Management Sdn Bhd (SJAM), which is currently being examined by the Securities Commision (SC) due to irregularities in its accounts.
Chief executive officer Datuk Seri Nazir Razak said: “We are concerned about this.
CIMB Bank Group Chief Executive Datuk Seri Nazir Razak delivering his keynote address at the CIMB Private Banking Conference 2010 on Wednesday.
SJAM was one of two fund managers our private bankers had recommended to clients and by extension, some of them had invested in the asset management company.”
Asked if the investment by CIMB clients placed in SJAM was high, Nazir said high was a relative number. “The key thing is that even if it was one sen placed in SJAM, it’s our clients’ money.”
Beyond these facts, Nazir said he did not know more, except that the SC was examining SJAM’s records and that independent auditors had been called in to look closer at its accounts