Bracing for change
Having survived several years of poor performance in investment markets, investment managers welcome improving markets but continue to face a challenging agenda with fundamental changes across numerous fronts:

• Changes in the industry structure, including the growing importance of hedge funds and an emerging trend to a multi-manager approach.
  
• A move by move in the industry to outsource significant back office functions – including many functions for which there is not yet a ‘mature’ outsourcing industry.
  
• A need to motivate and retain high performing fund managers whilst maintaining a team ‘culture’.
  
• A more proactive approach by regulators - including a growing emphasis on money laundering legislation; possible remedial action for mis-selling of split capital investment trusts; the Spitzer investigations into late trading and market timing in US mutual funds; and the emerging discussion in the UK over the corporate governance of retail funds.
  
• The impact of FSA proposals to ‘unbundle’ charges paid to stockbrokers and on ‘soft commissions’.

Looking at the whole picture
Deloitte can help you tackle these challenges using our unrivalled knowledge of the sector. Our clients include traditional investment managers, alternative investment managers, venture capital managers, traditional investment funds and hedge funds.

Our client teams combine multiple perspectives – from regulatory to  tax to IT to restructuring – as well as in-depth industry knowledge.  Examples of our recent engagements include:

• Helping a major asset manager to develop and successfully launch a tax efficient, capital guaranteed UCITS III fund.  This involved a team from across our assurance, tax, treasury and management consulting practices.
  
• Setting up a new hedge fund businesses across multiple jurisdictions, gaining regulatory approval and raising finance for the businesses - involving teams from our assurance, tax and regulatory practices.
  
• Providing both project management support and industry specific business analysis skills to assist with a major back office outsourcing project.

We have also undertaken several joint projects with the IMA and the AITC, sit on various industry committees and have seconded a number of our people to the FSA and the IMA.