Financial services group van Eyk has revamped its Blueprint fund-of-fund product terminating mandates with Basis Capital and GMO and hiring a new manager in emerging markets.
Van Eyk's exposure to Basis Capital represented only 0.7 per cent of its alternatives fund.
Basis Capital collapsed after the meltdown in the US sub-prime market, and subsequently received a series of downgrades from the major research houses.
Van Eyk also terminated its $24 million international equity mandate with GMO.
"We redeemed our investments in GMO after the manager had been downgraded," van Eyk head of research Jerome Lander said.
Following its review of international equities, van Eyk hired Treasury Asia Asset Management to manage an $11 million emerging market mandate.
"We wanted more exposure to emerging markets. Our research concluded that many global managers do not have the capability set or do not permit adequate emerging market exposures in their mandate or benchmark. Our research also suggested small cap investing in emerging markets is best achieved with regional specialists," Lander said.
