Who let the dogs out? St James’s Place tops list of poor performing ‘dog fund’ managers
It seems the Baha Men’s 23-year-search for a canine-freeing culprit may finally be over. Who let the dogs out? It was money manager St James’s Place.
The London-listed firm, which manages some £157.5bn for investors, currently manages £29.3bn in laggard funds and has seen four of its vehicles labelled as the biggest ‘dogs’ in the industry, according to an industry-wide survey compiled by investment firm BestInvest.
The St James’s Place Global Quality fund was the biggest so-called dog fund with £11.47bn under management, followed by the St James’s Place Global Growth fund fund with £7.49bn and the St James’s Place International Equity fund with £7.09bn.
Cash managed by the firm represented some 63 per cent of the total dog fund assets in the new survey. The next highest fund group, Artemis, held £2.66bn dog funds, which accounts for 5.8 per cent of the overall assets on the list.
Bestinvest said market turbulence had dragged more funds globally into underperformance over the past 12 months but a host of firms had consistently lagged on their peers.
| Fund name | Size (£bn) | Value of £100 invested after 3 years | 3-year under performance (%) |
St. James’s Place Global Quality | 11.47 | 114 | -24 |
| St. James’s Place Global Growth | 7.49 | 109 | -28 |
| St. James’s Place International Equity | 7.09 | 101 | -36 |
| St. James’s Place Growth European Progress | 1.85 | 113 | -17 |
| Scottish Widows UK Growth | 1.82 | 120 | -14 |
“The fund management industry has become increasingly competitive over the past couple of decades with more players in the market and fund managers needing to perform exceedingly well just to be average,” said Jason Hollands, Managing Director of Bestinvest.
“For investors choosing to invest in actively managed funds, finding managers with the skill to deliver superior returns is vital if they are to justify paying the fees to be invested in those funds.”
The amount of funds identified as “serious and persistent underperformers” had ticked up to 56 in the latest list, a 27 per cent increase on 44 dog funds exposed in the last report released in February, Bestinvest found.
Cash held in underperforming funds has also swelled rapidly since the last list. The amount of assets held in dog funds surged 142 per cent to £46.2bn from £19.1bn.
A St James Place spokesperson told the Telegraph: “We continually monitor, review, and update our investment proposition to make sure we’re delivering the right outcomes for our clients.
“In the past two years four of the funds mentioned have undergone a change in manager and performance benefits of these changes will take time to filter through.”