Reasons for Dean’s departure have been scarce, with very little linking her to a rival firm.
Mark Dampier, head of research at Hargreaves Lansdown, has his own theory on why Dean may have left.
“It’s my impression that there isn’t another firm involved,” he said. “It may just be that she’d had enough.”
“She’s had a poor year, after having made a very good three years before. It didn’t work out for her at HSBC, but at Cazenove it was a different story. They were a very tight-knit group over there. It seemed like everyone got on along with eachother really well and there was a great atmosphere.”
“Schroders is a totally different atmosphere and another big firm.”
Dampier rates Schroders highly, including a number of funds run by the group on his buy-list; however, he says certain managers work better in smaller boutique firms.
Here, FE Trustnet highlights three of the highest profile fund managers who have worked at big-name firms in the past but are now their own boss.
Nick Train
The FE Alpha Manager has one of the best records of any UK equity manager of his generation, leading his Finsbury Growth & Income IT and Lindsell Train UK Equity funds to significant outperformance in the medium and long-term.
Performance of trust and index over 10yrs
Source: FE Analytics
The trust, which Train took over in 2000, is among the top-three performers in the IT UK Equity Income sector over three, five, 10 and 15 year periods.
He joined boutique outfit GT Management in 1981 but left when it was bought by Invesco in 1998.
After a brief stint as a director and head of equities at M&G, he co-founded Lindsell Train investment management in 2001 and has been running it ever since.
“He was at M&G for a short stint but it was the wrong move for him,” said Dampier.
“Certain managers are just better working in smaller firms.”
Train has also had success with the Lindsell Train Global Equity fund, which is a top-quartile performer since its launch in May 2011 with returns of 57.85 per cent.
Like the UK funds, it is a high conviction portfolio of less than 30 stocks.
Click here to read a recent FE Trustnet interview with the manager.
Lindsell Train also has a Japanese fund, under the management of Michael Lindsell.
Neil Woodford
The most recent example of a star manager going it alone is of course Neil Woodford, who left Invesco Perpetual in March of this year after more than 25 years, setting up Woodford Investment Management shortly after.
His Invesco Perpetual Income and High Income funds became staples with UK investors, a recent poll showing that more than half of FE Trustnet readers have exposure to at least one of the portfolios.
£1,000 invested in High Income when Woodford took it over in 1988 would have been worth almost £25,000 by the time he left.
Performance of £1,000 initial investment in fund and index Feb 1988 - March 2014
Source: FE Analytics
“One of the reasons why Neil he was sick with all the compliance,” Dampier said.
Woodford says that being able to handpick his team has put him in a better position to outperform compared to Invesco Perpetual, as outlined in an FE Trustnet article earlier this year.
Setting up alone has also allowed him to be transparent about his holdings.
He is currently one of the very few managers who publishes his entire portfolio, including weightings.
It’s early days, but the recently launched CF Woodford Equity Income fund has made a bright start, beating its sector average and FTSE All Share benchmark since its launch in June with returns of 4.37 per cent.
Performance of fund, sector and index since launch
Source: FE Analytics
Woodford runs the fund in exactly the same way as Invesco Perpetual Income and High Income funds, investing in a high conviction portfolio of quality companies.
Tobacco and healthcare are major overweights, and while large caps dominate the top-10, Woodford has small weightings to a number of small and micro-caps, including unquoted companies.
Terry Smith
Another high conviction investor, Terry Smith was one of the most distinguished brokers in the City in the 1980s and 1990s, working first at Barclays and then W Greenwell & Co, UBS Phillips & Drew and Collins Stewart.
He became chief executive of Collins Stewart and led the management buy-out of that company in the early 2000s.
Smith decided to set up his own asset management firm, Fundsmith, in 2010, launching the Fundsmith Equity fund in November of that year.
The fund invests in equities listed in developed countries, with the US currently accounting for 60 per cent of assets, the UK for 25 per cent and Europe for 15 per cent.
The manager has a very stringent bottom up process, investing in established companies that are leaders in their respective industries.
He explained his methods in more detail in an interview with FE Trustnet.
Fundsmith Equity has performed very strongly, returning 75.21 per cent since inception.
This compares to 37.28 per cent from the IMA Global sector average and 52.59 per cent from the MSCI World index.
Performance of fund, sector and index since launch
Source: FE Analytics
Smith stepped down as managing director of inter-dealing broker firm Tullett Prebon earlier this year, to concentrate on running Fundsmith.
He launched the group’s second portfolio – the Fundsmith Emerging Equities trust – in June.
Other high profile managers who have set up their own businesses include Jonathan Ruffer and Sebastian Lyon, who established Ruffer and Troy respectively.