Italy

ITALY ¬- Italian pension funds have been increasingly looking at fiduciary management solutions in the first quarter of this year, BlackRock head of Italian institutional business Alberto Salato said.

ITALY - Fondo Cometa has awarded two separate investment mandates for an overall value of €620m (US$836.7m) to Unipol Gruppo Finanziario (UGF) and Cattolica Assicurazioni (CA).

ITALY - Italy's largest pension fund Fondo Cometa has appointed BNP Paribas as its new custodian for its €5bn (US$6.8bn) portfolio.

SWITZERLAND/ITALY/UK - Swisscanto is planning a move into the Italian pension market after a recent expansion into the UK, a company official said.

ITALY - The pension fund for tourism, commerce and service sector workers (Fon.Te) launched manager searches for two of its defined contribution funds for mandates worth €900m (US$1.2bn).

ITALY - Italian pensions watchdog Commissione di Vigilanza sui Fondi Pensione (Covip) has called for a "modernisation" of the rules regulating the investments pension funds are allowed to make.

ITALY - Fondenergia, the pension fund for the Italian energy sector employees, has awarded a €760m (US$1.1bn) risk-overlay mandate to Feri Institutional Advisors, marking the largest institutional mandate for the advisor in Italy.

ITALY - Collective participants joining open Italian pension funds will now be able to nominate administrators, pension watchdog COVIP said.

ITALY - At least two Italian pension funds have dropped Monte dei Paschi di Siena (MPS) as custodian after Intesa San Paolo's (ISP) acquisition of the firm's custodian business led to conflicts of interests in their manager line-ups.

ITALY - Italy's largest pension fund Fondo Cometa has hired MangustaRisk to conduct what could be the year's largest manager search in Europe.