Private client investment manager Church House Investments is looking to expand into the UK retail market with its low volatility range of funds.
Church House was founded in 1999 and until now has been focused on managing portfolios for private individuals and institutional mandates.
The firm has appointed Albemarle Street Partners to help it launch into the financial adviser marketplace and has brought on Albemarle’s Sam Liddle as sales director in February.
The six Church House funds, which have Smith & Williamson Fund Administration as their authorised corporate director (ACD), are already listed within the IMA universe.
But the firm is set to overhaul the range by renaming the funds, adding clean fee share classes and adding them to platforms.
The range includes the £120m Church House Investment Grade Fixed Interest fund, run by James Mahon, and the £31m Tenax fund, which is in the second quartile for performance in the IMA Targeted Absolute Return sector in the past three and five years.
Church House is also in the early stages of launching a risk-graded model portfolio service (MPS) for financial advisers, based on its bespoke private client service.
Mr Liddle remains as a minority partner at Albemarle but is no longer involved in the management of the partnership as he will now be focusing on his role at Church House.
Dan Kemp, a former partner at Saltus, Mr Liddle, a former manager at Miton and Clive Hale, a former chief investment officer at Skandia Investment Management set up Albermarle in 2012.
The company’s aim is to help independent financial advisers and other financial services firms, including fund management companies, improve their investment proposition by providing expert specialist advice.
It has also recently teamed up with Chelsea Financial Services to launch an independent fund rating and research service called FundCalibre, due to launch this year.
