Australian Fund Manager Outsources to Northern Trust

(March 31, 2011) — QIC, one of Australia’s largest institutional fund managers with $55.9 billion under management as of the end of 2010, has selected Northern Trust as its investment operations provider while retaining incumbent custodian National Australia Bank Asset Servicing for back office services.

“Outsourcing middle office services will give QIC a flexible and scalable operational platform to support our local and global investment management activities,” QIC Chief Executive Doug McTaggart said in a statement. “We chose Northern Trust because of their depth and breadth of expertise in middle office services and their ability to deliver what QIC is looking for.”

As a custody services provider, Northern Trust will offer middle-office functions, including unit pricing, registry, trade services, reconciliations, investment accounting, performance and risk analytics, post-trade compliance monitoring, client reporting, fee administration and billing.

Paul Cutts, Northern Trust’s managing director for Australia and New Zealand, said the decision reflected Northern Trust’s strength in market-leading solutions for asset managers and asset owners in the region. “Our Investment Operations Outsourcing team can help fund managers to execute their business strategy better, faster, and more predictably at a time when that has never been more important,” Cutts said in the release. “We look forward to supporting QIC’s continued growth in the Australian fund market, as well as the launch of new fund structures in Europe and other markets where QIC sees demand for its institutional strategies.”