The largest management company with foreign capital, TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners, has changed owners. The financial structures of Russian Railways and the French BNP Paribas Investment Partners sold their shares to the head of the Alor group of companies, Anatoly Gavrilenko, one of the consolidators of non-state pension funds (NPFs). Experts assess the changes that have taken place as negative: one of the last market companies went to closed structures.

One of the largest deals has been completed on the Russian trust management market. Financial structures of Russian Railways and the management company BNP Paribas Investment Partners (part of the international financial group BNP Paribas) sold their shares in TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners to the structures of the head of the Alor group of companies Anatoly Gavrilenko. "The company is completely passing under the control of the Russian shareholder Anatoly Gavrilenko, the deal has already been completed," Vladimir Kirillov, general director of TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners, confirmed the information. Mr. Gavrilenko sees the acquisition as a good company "with efficient management and a large amount of funds" which he hopes "will be good for the Russian economy." Control over the management company passed about a week ago, Kommersant's sources in the market specified.

TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners (originally KIT Finance, then KIT Fortis Investments) has been operating in the trust management market since 2002 and is one of the top 10 largest Russian asset management companies. According to the company, as of April 30, 2015, the total volume net assets under management and consulting exceeded 153 billion rubles. According to Kommersant's data, at the beginning of the year a third of the investment portfolio was made up of funds from foreign investors. Revenue from trust management services in 2014 exceeded RUB 562 million.

The reason for the sale of a stake in the management company, the executive director of NPF Blagosostoyanie (controlled by Russian Railways), Yuri Novozhilov, called the fund’s decision to focus on managing pension reserves (pension savings were allocated to a separate fund, Blagosostoyanie OPS, and sold to Boris Mints’ O1 Group investment company at the end of last year) . "To manage them, we have companies with which we have historically cooperated. TKB BNP Paribas worked with pension savings and concentrated on managing market assets, and market leaders pension savings made us a good offer,” he explained. A request to the BNP Paribas group went unanswered yesterday.

The participants do not disclose the price of the transaction, but, according to sources close to one of the parties, it was set at the level of the company's capital (about 800 million rubles). Experts note that this is not much, only 0.5% of assets under management, while on average management companies estimate it at 1-2% of assets. "It is very likely that foreigners will withdraw most of the assets simultaneously with the sale of the company," says a Kommersant source familiar with the situation.

However, according to Vladimir Kirillov, the company will continue to develop the same areas as before - managing the funds of institutional investors and consulting on the management of foreign funds. "The staff will be retained after the change of shareholders, and the company will operate autonomously," said Mr. Kirillov. Anatoly Gavrilenko, who is a shareholder of three large NPFs (KIT Finance, Heritage, Promagrofond), admits that the acquired management company will be connected to the management of pension savings.

Market participants evaluate the sale of the company negatively. "This was one of the last companies with foreign capital and an interesting model of work, in which the Russian team managed the money of BNP Paribas. It is also important that it was one of several market companies, and the transition to the control of new structures is an obvious step towards captivity , work with the assets of NPFs," complains Alfa Capital CEO Irina Krivosheeva. "TKB BNP Paribas is one of the few honest and market players with whom it is interesting to compete, but now it has been sold to a closed structure, and it is not clear how it will develop further," says Anton Rakhmanov, CEO of Sberbank Asset Management. In his opinion, the key role in the deal was played by the geopolitical factor and the foreign company's desire to "turn off business in Russia."

Maria Yakovleva, Yulia Lokshina, Kirill Sarkhanyants

(Photo: personal archive)

Vladimir Tsuprov, Managing Director for Investments at TKB Investment Partners, is responsible for the investment portfolio of almost 300 billion rubles. Under his leadership, the volume of the company's assets in 2015 increased by 128%, which brought it to the fourth place among the largest Russian management companies, and the mutual investment fund of foreign currency bonds became the second most profitable fund on the Russian market in five years. About how to manage big money, why it is better to do it from St. Petersburg and what will happen to the Russian economy, Tsuprov told RBC.

"It's too noisy in Moscow"

• My path to the financial industry was very short: I graduated from the St. Petersburg University of Economics and Finance, where I studied at the Department of Securities, and then quite quickly went through all the steps of the career ladder - from an equity analyst to a managing director for investments.
• When I started my career in 1998, I had to learn from my mistakes and the mistakes of the people around me. I have no authority in investment sphere, but I treat any interesting experience with attention.
• I have been managing assets for over ten years, being in St. Petersburg, as well as my team, which in no way affects the effectiveness of the process. Moreover, it eliminates the extra noise that constantly surrounds the manager. Moscow's investment space, seething and full of rumours, blurs perception and can distract from work. It's better to be away from it.
• I am a trustee, which means I work within the strict limits set by the client and the current legislation. I have two main tasks: the first is to ensure the quality work of the team in the chosen market, the second is to refuse to work in the market for which I have no expertise. For some reason, it is customary to ignore the latter in Russia.
• The manager has unique abilities- He makes decisions quickly in conditions when others understand little. We can easily bet millions of dollars in the face of total uncertainty. But I must know the measure: even if the potential income from the transaction is huge, I have no right to invest more money in it than the risks allow. Those who do not follow this rule always end up the same way - bankruptcy.

Vladimir Tsuprov

Born in 1976 in Leningrad. Graduated from St. Petersburg State University economics and finance, majoring in finance and credit. He has been working in the investment business since 1998. In 2000, he headed the analytical department at Web-Invest Bank, in 2002 he took the position of Deputy General Director of KIT Finance Management Company. In 2003-2005, Tsuprov held senior positions at the National Development Bank. In 2005, he returned to KIT Finance Management Company as Director of the Asset Management Department. Today he is the Managing Director for Investments at TKB Investment Partners.

• The main principle of the manager- understand what needs to be done, why and what risks arise in this case. The golden combination of these factors, coupled with the ability to extract the information necessary for making a decision, is the key to success. You can always improve on this.
• In our company the investment process is constantly evolving, and now there are even two approaches competing with each other. One is based on the calculation of the sustainability of the future cash flow company when assessing the value of its shares, the other - on the methods of value-investment, when the company's value is estimated according to historical data.
• We see a crisis of confidence to the managers. People do not want to give money to other people who, as they think, put their savings in some kind of black box, cut coupons from it themselves, and the investor gets "how it happened."

“The economy will not return to stable growth”

• Obvious investment ideas can not be. Billions of rubles and billions of dollars are spinning on the market, so all the ideas that once lay on the surface have long been bought out. If it were obvious where to invest money now, these assets would immediately become very expensive.
• In 2015 Russian Eurobonds received profitability both from the devaluation of the ruble and from the growth of dollar prices for these securities. There is no great merit of the managers in this, because those who managed such funds "left" on the fall of the ruble and the growth of the American currency. So, if you want to praise a Eurobond portfolio manager, then you should look not at profitability, but at how he performed compared to competitors or a benchmark.
• This year there will hardly be Eurobonds as attractive as in 2015. Bonds have already appreciated very well. For this growth to continue, they must reach zero returns, but this is impossible. Therefore, now we are not talking about how to get super profits, but about how to show a return that significantly exceeds deposits.

"TKB Investment Partners - Currency Bond Fund"

The value of net assets (as of May 30, 2016) is 439.2 million rubles, shares - 27.3 thousand rubles. Invests in available international markets government and corporate Eurobonds of issuers from Russia and the CIS countries, as well as into currency bonds guaranteed by companies from Russia and the CIS countries. According to Investfunds, it has become the most profitable mutual fund on the Russian market (among those actively traded) in five years. Its result (as of December 31, 2015) is 150.84%. At the same time, in 2015 the fund showed a yield of 38.03%.

• Eurobond mutual funds bear significant costs compared to deposits - more than 2% per year. The manager, in order to outperform a deposit with a rate of 2% per annum in foreign currency, needs to earn 5% per annum "dirty". Then, minus the costs, this will be a good result for the client. Now the manager has to think about this, and not about how to repeat the result of 2015.
• A few years ago at one of the client presentations, I said that I did not see opportunities for a significant increase in the MICEX index and did not understand what could be the reason for it. And then “it came from where they didn’t expect it”: more than twofold devaluation of the ruble pushed the ruble index to new heights. Today, the main factors that will influence the quotes of Russian shares are the ruble exchange rate and the dynamics of interest rates.
• What matters now is not whether the Russian economy has a chance to bounce off the "bottom". The important thing is that there is nowhere to bounce: the force of gravity will pull us back. The Russian economy may stabilize and grow by 1-2%, but this will not be a sustainable upward movement. The economy will not return to stable growth, and in the long run it may continue to fall. It is quite difficult to prove this, since it is already felt at the level of intuition.

Managing Director for Investments, TKB Investment Partners Vladimir Tsuprov (Photo: personal archive)

"Learn to take out the trash"

• We live in conditions littered information space. The investment industry, as one of the most difficult, is littered to the limit. Even at Sony, Nikon, and Canon, marketing departments decide what specifications new digital cameras should have. Learn to sort out this information garbage. If this is difficult, then invest in bank deposits.
• The first question to be answered is is the currency in which you will invest. You also need to understand how long the investment portfolio is formed. Having answered these two questions, you can already think about the assets in which you will invest money.
• If you want foreign exchange savings, but not in the form of a bank deposit, then you should pay attention to mutual funds that invest in foreign exchange instruments. They are good because you don't have to pay income tax from currency revaluation. This favorably distinguishes units in such mutual funds from buying Eurobonds on a brokerage account. And if they introduce additional taxes on foreign currency deposits, then this instrument will turn out to be the best way save money in foreign currency
• Remember that with 1st of January 2015 you have the opportunity to receive tax deduction(do not pay personal income tax at 13%) in the future if you invest in any mutual funds for more than three years. This is a very serious advantage, which significantly increases the attractiveness of mutual funds as investment instruments.

TKB Investment Partners

Formerly TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners, KIT Finance and KIT Fortis Investments. It has been operating in the trust management market since 2002. Until 2015, it was the largest management company with foreign capital in Russia, the owners are the French BNP Paribas Investment Partners and the financial structures of Russian Railways. In July 2015, they sold their shares to the head of the Alor group of companies, Anatoly Gavrilenko.

10.07.2015 09:00

Anatoly Gavrilenko bought TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners

Having parted ways with both former owners, the management company will change its name to TKB Investment Partners, but retain the strategy and team.

100% control over TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners passed to Anatoly Gavrilenko, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Alora and the beneficiary of the pension funds KIT Finance NPF, Promagrofond and Heritage. “The new shareholder fully supports the company's goals, positively evaluates the results of its development and the achievements of the management,” the management company's message emphasizes.

Previously, the company was owned on a parity basis by BNP Paribas Investment Partners (a division of the French group BNP Paribas) and structures of Russian Railways. The parties did not disclose the amount of the transaction, but according to Kommersant sources close to one of them, the figure is comparable to the capital of TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners.

As of May 31, the company's own funds amounted to 655 million rubles, and the volume of net assets under management and consulting, according to its data, was 136 billion rubles. According to the National rating agency, over the year, the assets under management of the company fell sharply - by 43% to 115 billion rubles (at the end of March). At the same time, the volume own funds over the same period increased by 2% to 674 million rubles.

General Director of TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners Vladimir Kirillov expects his company to continue to be profitable

According to RBC's source, one of the reasons for the sale of its stake by BNP Paribas was the reluctance of Western investors to do business in Russia after the extension of sanctions. At the same time, the need for Russian Railways to own its own management company disappeared after part of its pension empire was acquired by the O1 group of Boris Mints.

Having changed its name to TKB Investment Partners, the company will remain an investment center for Russian securities for domestic and foreign clients. “Such a purchase is a unique chance on the market! The company employs excellent professionals who are able to follow the plan and develop it independently, as they did in all previous years,” Gavrilenko said in the message.

“I am glad that the new shareholder fully shares the view of management on further development,” commented on the transaction CEO company Vladimir Kirillov, emphasizing that his management company is "independent and autonomous" and conducts operations solely at the expense of its own profits.

A partner of UniCredit Bank, the management company TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners (OJSC), has decided to merge mutual investment funds.

The pooling of funds is carried out to optimize the line of funds based on a thorough analysis of market trends, preferences of shareholders and more than 10 years of experience of the management company. Also, the purpose of the merger is to increase the efficiency of fund management, and shareholders will be able to take advantage of more promising investment products.

In this regard, from November 25, 2014, the acceptance of applications for operations with investment units of all funds participating in the merger procedure will be suspended. Also, applications for the exchange of investment units of other funds managed by TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners (OJSC) for investment units of affiliated funds will not be accepted temporarily.

Not later than December 1, 2014, the conversion (exchange) of investment units will be carried out and the acceptance of applications for operations with investment units of the funds to which the connection has been made will be resumed.

After the merger, allowances and discounts will apply in accordance with the rules of trust management of the fund to which the merger was carried out. At the same time, the amount of the discount for the redemption of shares of the fund to which the connection was made will be determined based on the period of time from the date of conversion of the shares to the date of their redemption.

TKB BNP Paribas Investment Partners (OJSC) (License to manage investment funds, mutual funds and non-state pension funds, issued by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on June 17, 2002 under No. 21-000-1-00069, the validity of the License is indefinite; License of a professional participant in the securities market to carry out securities management activities, issued by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on April 11, 2006 under No. 078-09042-001000, the validity of the License is unlimited).

OPIF of bonds "TKB BNP Paribas - Bond Fund" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Commission for Securities of Russia on December 24, 2002 under No. 0081-58233855); OPIF of mixed investments "TKB BNP Paribas - Balanced Conservative Fund" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Commission for Securities of Russia on December 24, 2002 under No. 0078-58234010); OPIF of shares "TKB BNP Paribas - Share Fund" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the FCSM of Russia on July 16, 2003 under No. 0122-58234576); OPIF of shares of TKB BNP Paribas - Russian Oil (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Commission for Securities of Russia on December 24, 2002 under No. 0080-58233938); OPIF of shares of TKB BNP Paribas - Russian Electric Power Industry (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Commission for Securities of Russia on December 24, 2002 under No. 0079-58233772); OPIF of shares "TKB BNP Paribas - Telecommunications and Innovations" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Securities Commission of Russia on March 21, 2003 under No. 0096-58227323); OPIF of the money market "TKB BNP Paribas - Money Market Fund" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on October 27, 2004 under No. 0273–58234047); OPEIF index "TKB BNP Paribas - MICEX Index" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on November 11, 2004 under No. 0276-58234367); OPIF of shares "TKB BNP Paribas - Prospective Investments" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on June 30, 2004 under No. 0224-58234352); OPEIF index "TCB BNP Paribas - RTS Index" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on December 29, 2005 under No. 0455-75409706); OPIF of shares "TKB BNP Paribas - Russian metallurgy and engineering" (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on September 13, 2005 under No. 0404-75408026); OPEIF shares of TKB BNP Paribas - Premium. Share Fund” (Rules for Trust Management of the Fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on February 28, 2006 under No. 0478-75408434); OPEIF of shares of TKB BNP Paribas - Russian Consumer Sector (Rules of trust management of the fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia on November 8, 2007 under No. 1074-58228736); OPIF of shares "TKB BNP Paribas - Share Fund 2" (Rules of trust management of the Fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia dated September 20, 2007 under No. 0989-94131910); OPIF of mixed investments "TKB BNP Paribas - Mixed Investment Fund 2" (Rules of trust management of the Fund were registered by the Federal Financial Markets Service of Russia dated September 20, 2007 under No. 0990-94131837).