Aviva

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Barclays has appointed Aviva's John McFarlane to succeed Sir David Walker as chairman in 2015.

Chris Reid, manager of the Majedie UK Income fund, has been topping up his highest conviction positions and increasing the portfolio's concentration, in the expectation divergence between winners and losers will increase.

Invesco Perpetual's Global Targeted Returns fund has pulled ahead of its main competitor in its first year of existence, prompting fund buyers to reconsider their options in the absolute return space.

Aviva UK has reported a 21% drop in the value of new life business it wrote in the first half of the year, mainly due to a steep fall in annuity business.

Multi-asset investors have been upping their cash allocations as fears of a market correction escalate and safe-haven opportunities in other asset classes dry up.

Aviva's platform has said it is on course to achieve profitability in 2016 and its target of £6bn in AUM by the end of the year, after assets doubled in the last 12 months.

Platforms are racing to update their conversion programmes as advisers complain about hefty charges when switching clients into clean share classes.