St James’ Place has made a raft of changes to its fund management offering, taking major mandates away from Aberdeen Asset Management and Stewart Investors, part of First State Investments.
The wealth manager said the SJP Far East fund, part of a £1.5bn mandate, will no longer be run by Aberdeen’s Hugh Young as of the fourth quarter of 2016.
The move forms part of a series of switches, another of which will see a portion of the £4bn Worldwide Opportunities strategy taken away from Stewart Investors’ Jonathan Asante in favour of Artisan Partners.
Mr Asante, who stepped back from day-to-day fund management at Stewart earlier this month, will also been removed from the £680m Global Emerging Markets mandate. He will be replaced by his former colleague Glen Finegan, now at Henderson - a move which will see the capacity-constrained strategy re-open to new investment.
But the withdrawals from First State have been offset by the fact that the Far East fund, renamed as the SJP Asia Pacific fund as part of a shift away from Japanese equities, will now be run by Alistair Thompson and Martin Lau, part of First State Stewart Asia.
The changes, led by the SJP investment committee headed by chief investment officer Chris Ralph, will also see fixed income specialist Babson Capital dropped. The firm was put under review earlier this year following a manager departure.
Management of the £2bn International Corporate Bond strategy will now shift to US-based Oaktree Capital and a Danish-based team from Capital Four.
SJP’s £125m High Octane mandate will also see changes, with the strategy changing to global small cap and manager Richard Oldfield, of Oldfield Partners, replaced by Denver’s Paradice Investment Management.
A final switch will see a portion of the Global Equity strategy shift from US boutique Tweedy Browne to J O Hambro Capital Management’s Ben Leyland.
SJP is also to launch a Worldwide Income fund, to be run by Investec Asset Management’s Clyde Roussouw.
Mr Ralph said: “The proposed changes announced today demonstrate our commitment to this task and we believe will provide our clients with increased potential to achieve their financial objectives over the long term.”
“These developments provide a tangible demonstration of the benefits of our investment approach in action.”
Mr Young said he handed the portfolio over in “good shape” for the First State duo.
He added: “We’re very proud of our long-term track record on the Fund and the returns we have generated for investors.
”Strong outperformance year-to-date indicates a welcome return to good fundamentals being rewarded in contrast to the indiscriminate, liquidity fuelled market rallies of recent years.”
