Investment Fund Operations & Administration (The Financial Academy)

This is a 3-day programme designed to provide a fundamental understanding of alternative assets such as hedge funds, pension funds, ’40 Act Funds and Unit Trusts. We will touch on portfolio construction, management, risk management and internal/external fund administration.

Primary Topics:

• Overview of Alternative and Traditional Assets
• Comparison of fund types and their structures
• Understanding benchmarks, mandates, investment objectives and constraints
• Pricing and valuation reporting & compliance – valuation, reconciliation and settlement
• Registrar and transfer agency services
• International client services
• Client reporting: customised reporting, multi-currency/instrument reporting, and tax reporting Compliance, tax and anti-money laundering issues

Why Attend

• Equip yourself with a clear understanding of how and why funds are established, the nature and impact of investment decisions, pricing and valuation, related activities such as portfolio balancing and performance measurement and how these processes affect operational, compliance, reporting, and other administration procedures.
• Examine a wide range of fund types, their characteristics, operation and administration features, including: mutual funds and unit trusts, pension fund, hedge funds and FOFs, real estate funds, venture capital funds, money market funds.
• Enhance your market knowledge not only of traditional investment products such as bonds, equities and money market products, but also of more complex products such as derivatives, CDOs, structured products, exchange traded funds, real estate, private equity, commodities and any related structures such as SPVs, SIVs etc.
• Increase your confidence in controlling fund administration procedure, accurate pricing, valuation and best execution skills,
• Reassure your skills in the correct legal and compliance procedures, and confidence in liaising with fund managers, investors, sponsors, fund services providers, custodians, and regulators.

Agenda

Day 1

Explanation of the course team exercise – analyzing the impact of a new fund business proposal on the administration provider Introduction to Investment & Investment Funds

• The investment environment today and key influences on investment
• Brexit, US Presidential Election, Emerging markets etc
• Types of fund – securities, alternative investment funds (property, hedge, private equity), other funds
• The concepts of investment strategy and risks
• Discussion of News items that might impact on investment and fund performance
• Asset characteristics and asset allocation
• Securities
• Derivatives
• Other types of assets
• The regulatory environment for investment funds
• Retail and non-retail funds
• Regulated and unregulated funds
• Examples of the regulatory environment

Setting Up a Fund

• Key stages and requirements in setting up a fund
• Key players and their roles
• Promoters
• Investment managers and advisers
• Management companies
• Governance
• Secretary
• Custodian/depositary
• Administration
• The Offering documents

Overnight Exercise – creating a portfolio and offering documents

Day 2

Discussion of news items and review of the Overnight Exercise

Operation of the Fund – Overview

• High level overview of the fund proces

Operation of the Fund – Part 1 -The transfer agency role

• Dealing with investors
• Offering documents
• Subscription and redemption process
• KYC and AML checks
• Notifications
• Potential problems

Operation of a Fund – Part 2-operations team

• Role of the operations team
• Communication with the investment manager and broker/prime broker/advisers
• Communications with the Custodian/Depositary
• Communication with the valuation & accounting team
• Stages in the portfolio process
• Transaction capture
• Validation
• Posting
• Reconciliations
• Position management
• Cash flows
• Corporate actions
• Margin calls
• Collateral management
• Potential problems

Day 3

Operation of the Fund – Part 3 Valuation and Accounting Team

• Role of the valuations and accounting team
• Easy and difficult to value assets
• NAV structure, purpose and calculations
• Creating the Pricing Policy
• Pricing Errors and Problems
• Fees
• Initial Fees
• Management Fees
• Service Fees
• Performance Fees and Carried Interest
• Equilisation
• Accruals – expenses and income
• Bookkeeping
• Accounting Principles
• General Ledger
• Tax – including withholding tax (WHT)
• Financial statements and management reporting

Operation of the Fund – Part 4 Risk and Compliance

• Role of Compliance – in the fund
• Regulatory
• Internal policies
• Role of compliance in fund administration
• Regulatory
• Internal policies
• Service provision
• Procedure documentation and audit trails
• Role of risk management for the fund and administrator
• Market risk
• Counterparty/credit risk
• Operational risk
• Risk management frameworks
• Identifying risk
• Measuring risk
• Control framework
• KRIs & KPIs
• Structure of a risk event
• Managing a risk event
• Problems and impacts

Closing exercise – presenting the analysis of the impact of a new fund business proposal on the administration provider