The Mackenzie Northleaf Global Private Equity Fund is now available to accredited investors in both registered and non-registered accounts, Mackenzie Investments and Northleaf Capital Partners have announced.
That means the fund is now available to accredited investors in RRSPs, TFSAs, Registered Retirement Income Funds, Registered Education Savings Plans and First Home Savings Accounts. Previously, it was only available in non-registered accounts.
“It was important for us to make this fund eligible for registered plans so that it would be easier for advisors to use this private equity fund with as many of their clients as possible,” said Allan Seychuk, vice-president, alternatives with Mackenzie Investments, in an interview from Toronto.
“And I think it presents new opportunities for clients that might not have had exposure to private equity.”
The Mackenzie Northleaf Global Private Equity Fund invests in a diversified portfolio of global private equity investments, including in private equity funds and private equity managers.
“It’s a very highly diversified portfolio across industry and across geography,” focused on small- to medium-sized companies across North America and Western Europe, Seychuk said.
“And it’s investing in companies that are profitable, so this is buyout private equity, as opposed to venture or early-stage speculative private investing. These are well-established businesses that are cash-flow positive.”
The management expense ratio is 1.8% for the fund’s F series and 2.8% for its A series. There are also performance fees charged on the private equity investments the fund holds, which Mackenzie end investors pay indirectly, “and they reduce the returns that we’re getting from our private equity managers,” Seychuk said. However, he noted that after all these fees, the fund has delivered a 26% annualized return since its inception in 2022.
“It’s doing very well. And that’s about 10% better than its public equity benchmark per year,” he said.
Overall though, Seychuk said it’s important for investors “to dig into each private equity fund that they are interested in” and to ask fund managers to explain their structures, associated fees and liquidity limitations.
Mackenzie Investments and Northleaf Capital Partners, a global private-markets investment firm, became strategic partners in 2020. Since then, the two firms have launched four funds designed to increase access to private-market investments.
A new mutual fund with layers
AGF Investments Inc. has launched an alternative mutual fund that invests in U.S. equities and uses options strategies, the firm announced Friday.
The AGF Enhanced U.S. Income Plus Fund may also use leverage, primarily with derivatives, a release said.
The fund is offered in both Canadian dollar and U.S. dollar purchase options and in multiple series.
CI launches performance-based investment solution
CI Global Asset Management (CI GAM) has launched a new performance-based investment solution called CI Performance Series.
Rather than charging a fixed management fee, the CI Performance Series charges a performance fee only when an investment pool outperforms its reference benchmark. The performance fee, calculated quarterly, will be “30% of the amount by which the total return of a pool’s performance series exceeds that of its reference benchmark,” a Feb. 27 release explained.
The CI Performance Series, available in series AP and FP, includes the following seven CI funds:
- CI Canadian Equity Growth Private Pool
- CI Select Global Equity Private Pool
- CI High Yield Bond Private Pool
- CI Global Infrastructure Private Pool
- CI Global Small/Mid Cap Equity Private Pool
- CI International Equity Growth Private Pool
- CI U.S. Equity Private Pool
The FP series has a 0% management fee, while the AP series has a management fee of up to 1%, “consisting solely of a trailing commission to be paid to the investor’s dealer,” the release noted. Both series have an administration fee of 0.15%.
CI GAM said it intends to place an asset cap on the performance-based series funds: “Once the assets under management in the Performance Series of a pool reach a combined $1 billion, the Performance Series units of the pool will be closed to new investments.”
A new emerging market ETF emerges
Desjardins Investments Inc. has launched an ETF that seeks to replicate the performance of an emerging market equity index.
The Desjardins Emerging Market Equity Index ETF (TSX: DMEE) seeks to replicate the performance of the Solactive GBS Emerging Markets Large & Mid Cap CAD Index (CA NTR).
“Under normal market conditions, DMEE will primarily invest in large- and mid-cap securities of emerging markets companies,” a release said.
Desjardins said the new ETF completes its lineup of index ETFs that it launched in 2024.
It carries a 0.25% management fee.
Global X introduces U.S.-dollar-denominated version of ETF
Global X Investments Canada Inc. (Global X) has launched a U.S.-dollar-denominated version of a fund that provides interest income through exposure to Government of Canada treasury bills (T-Bills).
The U.S.-dollar-denominated version of the Global X 0-3 Month T-Bill ETF (TSX: CBIL) began trading on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Feb. 25 under the ticker symbol CBIL.U.
The fund has a 0.1% management fee. It will make distributions to unitholders on a monthly basis, a release said.
A second firm plans to launch a Solana ETF
CI Global Asset Management (CI GAM) has filed a preliminary prospectus with Canadian securities regulators to launch an ETF that provides exposure to Solana.
If approved, the CI Galaxy Solana ETF would be listed with the ticker SOLX and would invest directly in Solana tokens. Its holdings would be priced based on the Bloomberg Galaxy Solana Index, which is designed to measure the performance of a single Solana token traded in U.S. dollars, a Feb. 20 release said.
CI GAM said it would manage the ETF, while Galaxy Asset Management would act as sub-advisor.
The firm’s announcement comes just weeks after 3iQ Corp. announced its intention to launch the first ETFs in the world that offer exposure to cryptoassets Solana and XRP.
FTSE launches bond pricing solution
FTSE Russell has launched a new bond pricing service called FastQuote Plus (FQ+).
The new pricing service has “expanded security coverage, enhanced pricing transparency, and additional intra-day pricing snapshots” in the Canadian fixed-income market, FTSE Russell’s website said.
It includes composite and evaluated prices of fixed-income securities, with multiple snapshots per day and additional data fields.
The new service was developed in collaboration with FTSE Russell’s partner CanDeal, an online institutional multi-dealer-to-client Canadian debt securities trading network.
Multiple firms announce fund changes
Multiple investment managers have announced changes to their product lineups. These changes include fund mergers, investment objective changes, fund terminations, fee changes, fund name changes and updated risk ratings.
Here are some recent announcements:
- Barometer Capital Management Inc., the manager and trustee of the Barometer Tactical Income Growth Fund, has tweaked the risk rating of the fund from “low to medium” to “medium.” No changes will be made to the investment objective or strategy of the fund as a result, according to a release.
- SLGI Asset Management Inc., the investment manager of the Sun Life family of mutual funds, has decided to close the Sun Life JPMorgan International Equity Fund, Sun Life Multi-Strategy Bond Fund and Sun Life Nuveen Flexible Income Fund. The funds will be terminated at market close on May 2, but series I of each fund will remain open for eligible purchasers, a release said.
- After successfully receiving unitholder approvals, Global X Investments Canada Inc. said it will soon make changes to the investment objectives and names of three investment funds, along with fee changes for two of the funds and a distribution policy change for one of them. The changes are slated to take effect March 4. More information is available here.
- Canada Life Investment Management Ltd. has proposed a series of fund mergers and a change to a fund’s investment objective. More information is available here.
- Bristol Gate Capital Partners Inc. has announced a change to the risk rating for the U.S.-dollar version of the Bristol Gate Concentrated US Equity ETF (TSX: BGU.U). The fund’s risk rating was “medium” but has changed to “medium to high risk.”
- Manulife Investment Management Limited (Manulife IM) has announced a proposed fund merger, investment fund objective changes and fund terminations. More information is available here.
Correction: This story has been updated to reflect that the Mackenzie fund delivered an annualized return of 26% since 2022.