Mark Costar, the fund manager taking over from Alex Savvides at JO Hambro, has said the team working on the fund has expanded and demand from clients remains strong.
FT Adviser previously reported the JO Hambro UK Dynamic fund, which Savvides ran from launch until his departure in January, had an outflow of around £200mn in January alone.
Costar is a long-serving JO Hambro fund manager, running a UK growth strategy, and he will now work on both strategies.
Speaking to FT Adviser, Costar said his focus since January has been meeting existing clients rather than drumming up new business.
He said he has met clients representing the majority of the assets under management of the fund.
When you go to a company meeting (representing one fund) you can learn a lot that is useful for the other funds"The clients we are talking with are quite supportive," Costar said.
"The outflows we have seen have largely come from wealth managers that have an investment process which means they have to sell a fund when a manager changes.”
Costar told FT Adviser the changes do not represent a drop in resources on either of the funds.
"There will now be five people working across the two funds, before it was three people," he explained
"Of course the funds are different products, but there is a lot of shared intellectual capital between them. When you go to a company meeting (representing one fund) you can learn a lot that is useful for the other funds."
He added: "Both funds are valuation conscious, but I would say, the UK Dynamic fund is looking to invest in companies that may need to be turned around because they took on too much debt in the past, or made too many acquisitions.
"Whereas the UK Growth fund is maybe for companies that are on an established path.”
Costar has worked at JO Hambro for 20 years, and actually trained Savvides.
Also working on the strategy is Tom Matthews, who has worked on the UK Dynamic fund with Savvides for eight years.
Costar said: “The investment process was designed to be repeatable, and it is. Our performance last year was quite strong but that was based on a small number of stocks, I think the others will start to get going this year.”
david.thorpe@ft.com
