Fund managers flounder in January
It has been a sluggish start to the new year for Australia’s fund managers, accord-ing to the latest InTech Financial Services market survey.
It has been a sluggish start to the new year for Australia’s fund managers, accord-ing to the latest InTech Financial Services market survey.
In particular, value stocks have copped a hammering. During January, Australian value stocks declined by 5.6 per cent. In comparison, Australian growth stocks re-turned 0.9 per cent. For the year to January, Australian growth stocks returned 7.6 per cent, compared with the 12.9 per cent returns enjoyed by growth stocks.
Across the board, Australian share managers posted a loss of 2.4 per cent for Janu-ary. The All Ordinaries Accumulation Index fell during the same period by 1.8 per cent, mainly in response to increasing interest rates.
Among the stronger performers for January were HSBC High Alpha (-0.4 per cent), County ACE (-0.5 per cent) and, interestingly enough, value managers Tyn-dall (-0.6 per cent).
For to the year to January, AUSBIL led the charge, returning just under 23 per cent to investors. This was almost double the average return across the board of 11.7 per cent. Just behind AUSBIL was Wallara, returning 20.4 per cent and AMP Capital Approach (19.8 per cent).
International managers didn’t fare much better, with international sharemarkets down 3.3 per cent in Australian dollar terms in January. Despite the fall in overall value, Dresdner managed a positive return (1.5 per cent) for the start of 2000, fol-lowed by INVESCO (0.6 per cent) and Colonial First State (-0.6 per cent).
However, the figures for the year to January paint a brighter picture, with specialist international managers raking in returns of 21.3 per cent (outperforming the benchmark by 7.6 per cent).
The top three international managers’ returns were nothing short of spectacular. Top performers Platinum Asset Management returned 64.4 per cent, followed by Marvin & Palmer (64.2 per cent) and Nicholas-Applegate (61.5 per cent).
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