Tennis

Wawrinka, Tsonga and five players who could spring a surprise at 2017 French Open

Ahmed Rizvi

May 27, 2017

Rafael Nadal is the overwhelming favourite to win his 10th French Open title when the tournament begins next week. Here, Ahmed Rizvi looks at five players who could spring a surprise at Roland Garros.

Stan Wawrinka

Given his early exits from Monte Carlo, Madrid and Rome, the 2015 French Open champion will probably not inspire much confidence among the fans. But beware — Wawrinka has a knack of showing up and winning grand slams when few people expect him to. He heads to Paris having retained his Geneva Open title, too. Ignore him at your peril.

Alexander Zverev

The youngest member of the top 10, Zverev defeated the likes of Fabio Fognini, Milos Raonic, John Isner and Novak Djokovic on his way to his first Masters 1000 title in Rome last Sunday. The German also reached the last eight in Madrid, so confidence is high. But he has a tough first round against Spaniard Fernando Verdasco.

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga

A first-round loser in Monte-Carlo, Tsonga pulled out of his second round match in Madrid because of a shoulder injury, which also forced him to skip Rome. But he has come back to win the Lyon Open title and, let us not forget, he has reached the semi-finals at Roland Garros twice in the past four years.

David Goffin

A quarter-finalist at Roland Garros in 2016, Goffin defeated Dominic Thiem and Novak Djokovic in Monte Carlo and then put up a great show against Nadal in the Madrid quarter-final. If he can bring that form to Paris, he might just improve on his 2016 French Open showing.

Fabio Fognini

You have got to wonder why a man of his talents has such a pedestrian record at grand slams — 16 first round exits and a lone quarter-final in 36 majors. At the same time, you just cannot ignore him, not after the way he has played in recent weeks, especially his match against Nadal in Madrid and his victory over Andy Murray in Rome.

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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

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“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

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