Leo Kolivakis's blog

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Private Markets at a Breaking Point?





The challenges in private markets are also weighing on many institutional investors who are growing increasingly impatient with private equity groups charging hefty fees on the big funds they raised during the debt bubble. It's fair to say that unless activity picks up, private markets will reach a breaking point - one that may weaken the industry for a very long time.

 
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A New Era of Hedge Fund Transparency?





The rules of the game have changed. After the disaster of 2008, pension funds will be scrutinizing their investments a lot more carefully, especially their investments in alternatives like hedge funds, private equity, real estate and commodity funds. Those funds who refuse to adapt will find it extremely difficult to raise the money they need to compete.

 
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Are Labour's Fortunes Turning?





But even when employment eventually picks up, it will be the most meager recovery ever and the pick-up in activity will likely be in sectors like education, health care, infrastructure and alternative energy.

 
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Imperialism and Financialism: A Story of a Nexus?





In the opinion of many, the growing severity of recent financial, economic and military crises suggests that this ability has been greatly reduced and that U.S. hegemony is now coming to an end. The highly publicized nature of these imperial misgivings makes this latest version of the nexus seem persuasive.

 
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Cap Public Sector Pensions?





A doubling of the pension rate is terrible news? I got a better idea, why don't we also cap public sector pensions in North America? Any politician courageous enough to propose this idea here? Of course, that means a cut in their own gold plated pensions.

 
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Hedge Fund Heave-Ho?





Like I said at the start of this post, the world is awash with liquidity, so keep buying them dips and pay attention to the hedge fund heave-ho. It looks like things are getting bubbly all over again.

 
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The Cost of Doing Business?





The dirty little secret in the pension world is that kickbacks are more common than people think in the private markets and hedge funds where funds try to bribe underpaid pension fund managers. How do I know? Because I have been approached in the past (very subtle, using words like 'facilitate') and witnessed my fair share of shady deals across many pension funds where I asked myself why the heck is this pension fund manager so gun-ho on that fund?

 
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Pay Czar Reviewing GM's Pension Advisers?





My advice to the U.S. pay czar is to leave Nancy Everett and her team alone. Unlike the senior managers at most of Canada's large public pension funds, the folks at Promark Global Advisors earned their compensation by not following the herd, realizing the beauty of bonds, and by focusing on preservation of capital.

 
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Time to Clean House at Pensions?





Provincial finance ministers should conduct a thorough performance, operational and fraud audit using independent industry experts on every major public pension fund in Canada. Some of these funds are hiding much more than others, but they all have secrets they want to keep from the public and they all game their private market benchmarks to reap big bonuses at the end of their fiscal year.

 
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Overhaul or Tweak Pensions?





If Senator Kennedy were alive today, he would be spearheading the health care debate as well as the pension crisis. And he wouldn't be tweaking anything, but going for an overhaul of the entire system to ensure everyone retires in dignity and security.

 
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Holy Halabi! Worst Caisse Scenario?





The first thing that went through my mind is who is Simon Halabi? The second thing that went through my mind is who is the idiot at the Caisse that structured this deal? I mean who would agree to terms where the Caisse would hold the junior portion of a 1.45 billion- pound loan?
Something really stinks with this deal and I suspect there is a lot more to this than what we know.

 
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A Lesson in Liquidity?





I think that in the environment we are heading in, there will be a premium placed on liquidity. Long gone are the days where you tie up your money for ten years in private equity or accept lock-ups of three years with some hedge fund (some are stupid enough to do this).

 
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Will Pensions Follow Harvard's Mea Culpa?





While Harvard regroups and tacitly admits its mea culpa, most pension parrots will keep repeating the same mistakes, losing billions in the process. They will all learn the hard way.

 
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On Blogging Brawls and Bragging Rights





A couple of days ago Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism posted a comment, Who Is Tyler Durden? The post generated over 187 comments (and still counting), most of which were infantile swipes from morons claiming that one blog is better than the other one.

I got carried away too and used language that I shouldn't have, but after sleeping on it, I want to offer you some of my thoughts on these blogging brawls and bragging rights.

 
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