Investments  

Alliance Trust adds ninth fund manager

Alliance Trust adds ninth fund manager

A ninth fund management firm has been added to the roster managing money on behalf of Alliance Trust.

The investment management of the £3bn trust is performed by Willis Towers Watson, which is tasked with choosing the underlying fund managers.

In an announcement to the stock exchange this morning (2 September) Alliance Trust confirmed that a ninth fund management firm has been allocated 8.5 per cent of the capital.

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Vulcan Value Partners, a firm based in Alabama in the US, joined UK-based firms Jupiter and River and Mercantile alongside others.

Ben Whitemore at Jupiter runs 10 per cent of the capital, while Hugh Sargent at River and Mercantile runs 9 per cent. 

The full list of managers is:  

FIRM

MANAGER

% OF PORTFOLIO

Black Creek Investment Management

Bill Kanko

11.5

FPA

Pierre Py, Greg Herr

10.0

GQG Partners

Rajiv Jain

14.0

Jupiter Asset Management

Ben Whitmore

10.0

Lyrical Asset Management

Andrew Wellington

13.0

River and Mercantile Asset Management

Hugh Sergeant

9.0

SGA

George Fraise, Gordon Marchand, Rob Rohn

11.0

Veritas Asset Management

Andy Headley

13.0

Vulcan Value Partners

C.T. Fitzpatrick

8.5

Craig Baker, chief investment officer at Willis Towers Watson, said: “Vulcan’s appointment will provide the trust with access to another highly skilled active manager and will enhance further the portfolio’s diversity and risk control.

“What differentiates Vulcan from other ‘value’ managers is the team’s focus on capital preservation and long-term compounding opportunities. 

“We believe that the best way to deliver long-term outperformance to investors is to combine the best ideas from the best stock pickers globally into one highly active but diversified portfolio and offer it at a competitive fee.” 

The capital being managed by Vulcan has been taken from some of the other fund managers. 

The Alliance Trust has returned 4 per cent over the past year, compared with 0.4 per cent for the average trust in the AIC Global sector in the same time period. 

There are over 200 different investments in the fund when all of the individual stock holdings of the nine managers are considered. 

Alan Brierley, investment trust analyst at Investec, said he regards Alliance Trust shares as an attractive investment, and gives them a “buy” rating at the current time. 

Alliance Trust completed the sale of its platform business to Interactive Investor in July. 

david.thorpe@ft.com