Putnam joins Oz invasion

Another US manager is to hit our shores, following the recent announcement by Rothschild Australia Asset Management (RAAM) that it is to hand over more than $800 million of its international equity investments to Putnam Investments.

Another US manager is to hit our shores, following the recent announcement by Rothschild Australia Asset Management (RAAM) that it is to hand over more than $800 million of its international equity investments to Putnam Investments.

Putnam Investments is the fifth largest fund manager in the US. It manages US$370 billion for more than 12 million retail investors as well as about 1,000 in-stitutional investors. It has no direct distribution, preferring to work through third parties such as the banks, brokers and financial advisers.

RAAM’s managing director Peter Martin says the alliance, which will include both retail and wholesale products, is indicative of the growing number of Australians wishing to invest overseas. He says the move will complement Rothschild’s do-mestic asset offerings, which enjoyed their best performances this year. The deal will allow RAAM to take advantage of “Putnam’s broad and deep toolbox of high quality investment options” to make available to its clients, he says.

Martin says the next few months will see the bedding down of the agreement, with the possibility of developing new product following. “We’ll be talking about prod-ucts by the end of the first quarter next year,” he says.

The term of agreement will initially stretch for three years, though Martin says there are “plans on both sides that it lasts in perpetuity”.

Putnam Investments’ managing director John Boneparth says his group’s interna-tional business has grown about 400 per cent in the last three years. Putnam’s move into Australia was part of its “proactive opportunism” approach to overseas markets.

“We’ve been focussing on Japan and Europe for the past few years. Australia has been on our radar screen, though,” Boneparth says.