Fund Times: 24 – 28 November
Funds Under Management Fall 11% in October; Veritas Re-open Ezra Sun's Asian Fund; New Star Suspends Trading on International Property Fund; Lazard MD and UK Equities Head Retires; Old Mutual Japanese Select Fund Manager to Retire; and Artemis Close Absolute Return Hedge Fund
According to the Investment Management Association (IMA) UK domiciled investment funds assets under management fell by 11% in October, down to £338.9bn. Over the last 12 months fund under management are now down by 30%. The fall is not merely the consequence of declining asset prices but also the result of panicky investors moving their money to safer havens. As a result net retail sales were negative in October as outflows topped £500m. The Specialist sector was the hardest hit with outflows of £256m - with £117m of this coming out of property funds. The UK Gilts sector was the main beneficiary with an inflow of £154.8m in October.
Veritas Re-open Ezra Sun's Asian Fund
Veritas Asset Management announced this week that it has re-opened its Asian fund. The fund, managed by Ezra Sun, soft closed in September 2007 after the group felt it had reached capacity. Recent market falls have reduced the fund's AUM and Sun believes it can reopen to take advantage of the low valuations he sees across Asian markets. Over the last three years the fund has returned over 11.5% per annum more that its Morningstar Asia-Pacific ex-Japan Equity category peers. More recently Sun has lost 35% over 12 months, but this has still trumped the category by ten percentage points.
New Star Suspends Trading on International Property Fund
New Star this week announced that trading in the group’s International Property fund will be temporarily suspended with immediate effect. The move comes amid increased redemptions from the fund's institutional clients which have impacted the fund's liquidity. New Star has therefore suspended dealing in the fund until further notice while they look to restore liquidity. It is difficult to know how long the suspension will last as New Star may well have to sell properties to meet the redemptions. Any forced sales are likely to go through at discounted prices so in order to achieve a fair valuation in a struggling market the fund could stay closed for some time.
Lazard MD and UK Equities Head Retires
Lazard asset management announced this week that its managing director and head of UK equities, Tony Willis, has retired after nine years at the group. Willis will remain at the group until February 2009 in order to smooth the management transition of Lazard's UK Alpha and UK Omega funds which will pass to Alan Custis. Custis will be supported by Lazard UK Income and UK Smaller Companies manager Alan Clifford.
Old Mutual Japanese Select Fund Manager to Retire
Old Mutual have this week announced that Leslie Jones, the group’s Japanese equity specialist, is to retire after 16 years at the firm. Jones will stay at the group until April 2009 when Old Mutual’s quantitative strategy team will take over management of the Japanese Select fund, but the investment objective will not change.
Elsewhere at the group, Phil Hunter has been officially confirmed as manager on Old Mutual Asian Select after initially taking over on a temporary basis from Suresh Sadasivan in August this year.
Artemis Close Absolute Return Hedge Fund
Artemis has announced that it is to close its Dublin-domiciled Absolute Return fund run by former Jupiter Income manager William Littlewood. The fund was launched for Littlewood in December 2005 and mainly managed the money of a small number of private clients.