Principal moves on after St George ‘preferred partner’ split
Only days after being ejected from the St George preferred partners program, Principal Global Investors has announced it is to launch two new funds later this month.
The Principal Emerging Markets Fund and the Principal Global Equity Growth Fund follow Principal’s introduction of a global real estate investment trust late last year.
Managing director and head of sales and marketing Alex François said the new funds are part of a Principal strategy to “expand our retail strategy and product offerings in the Australian marketplace”.
On St George’s decision last week not to renew Principal’s membership of its preferred partners program, François said this was “solely to do with St George’s business priorities” for the program.
“As acknowledged by Geoff Lloyd, St George executive for wealth and Asgard wealth solutions chief executive, we enjoy strong retail market support from financial advisers for our highly-rated products.
“This is evidenced by ongoing inflows and inclusion on numerous IDPS platforms, including (the broader) Asgard platform as well as BT Wrap, Macquarie Wrap, Suncorp and others.
“Our products are also highly-rated by most of the major researchers, such as Lonsec, S&P, and Zenith.”
He said Principal had “no issues” with its membership of the partners program, and would “continue to have a very strong ongoing relationship with St George and Asgard”.
Lloyd announced last week that the decision to remove Principal was “no reflection” on the manager, but “rather a result of the qualitative and quantitative criteria attached to partner selection”.
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