After more than nine years at FE, head of publishing content Pascal Dowling is saying goodbye to the company at the end of the year. As well as heading up FE Trustnet editorial for a number of years and writing a fair few articles along the way, Pascal was responsible for the output of the entire site. We wish him the best of luck in the future.
Earlier this year the team said goodbye to former news editor Thomas McMahon, though he hasn’t gone too far, joining Rob Gleeson’s FE Research team just a few desks away. You’ll be sure to see his expert comment in our articles throughout 2015.
Thomas has been replaced by Gary Jackson – among his best articles of recent weeks include this one looking at seven investment themes that will dominate 2015 and beyond.
But that’s enough about us – this article is about all of you. As is custom, we turn the tables on our readers at this time of year and highlight our favourite comments of the past 12 months.
It’s been another record breaking year from this point of view, with well over 4,000 comments in total. Not all of them have been positive – luckily we’ve developed thick skin over the years – but it’s great to see that so many of our articles have evoked debate between you. We’ve even ‘borrowed’ a few of your ideas along the way!
Without further ado, here are our five favourite user comments of 2014:
Ian Lees: “John McClure has served our clients well, and he will be sadly missed. Our commiserations go to his family at this time.”
“Such an event occurs and it reminds me the reason we invest with managers is also the service and back up from his management team and the company he represents. It reminds us that we rely of people like John to select companies – which go through periods of lower value but come out worth more value – or are sold in the interim. Life is a cycle – good times, great times and times of challenge.”
“We are in it for the long term, are committed and assets such as John's funds have been designed with this in mind. We should respect his him and his work and thank him for the good he brought to us and to our clients. He will be sadly missed.”
Both thought-provoking and respectful, this was one of a number of condolences following the sad news that Unicorn UK Income’s John McClure died earlier this year. The fund has since been taken over by Fraser Mackersie and Simon Moon.
David Stephen: “Talking about where not to invest. What has happened to Cazenove? Since Schroders took them over both Cazenove UK Opportunities and Cazenove UK Smaller Companies have moved from top to bottom quartile performance. The latter is set to close to restrict inflows. With the way it is performing it should be more worried about outflows.”
A call that the very best multi-manager would have been proud of, David Stephen called the decline of these two Cazenove-cum-Schroder funds very early back in January, on the bottom of an article titled ‘Where not to invest in 2014’.
Paul Marriage’s Schroder UK Dynamic Smaller Companies fund is a bottom decile performer year-to-date with losses of more than 10 per cent, and has also experienced more outflows over the past 12 months than any other UK small cap portfolio. This, combined with the poor performance, has seen AUM more than half since the end of January to £665m, and the fund has re-opened to new investors as a result.
It’s been an even more difficult time for Schroder UK Opportunities, not only experiencing poor performance and outflows but also the departure of Julie Dean. FE Alpha Manager Matt Hudson has since taken charge.
Short-term underperformance is not always a sell sign, of course, though some experts expressed concern over the size of the funds long before mass outflows occurred.
Petandra: “It is one of the great paradoxes of the fund management industry that outstanding performance ultimately leads to decline and failure.”
While not necessarily always the case, this comment brilliantly sums up the all too familiar trend of successful managers taking on too much money and losing their way as a result. This study, which highlighted that small UK equity income funds have thrashed their larger rivals over the medium term, was one of many examining this issue.
Malcom Mattok: “I was one of the early investors in Neil Woodford's High Income fund and have a lot of respect for his expertise. However, he has had an excellent team supporting him and Mark Barnett is a very talented manager. Therefore, I won't be abandoning the new manager.”
“Given the reduction in size of the Income and High Income funds, and similarity in yield between them, I wonder whether there may be plans to merge them.”
Two managers whose styles arguably allow for many billions under management are Neil Woodford and Mark Barnett, who have never been far from FE Trustnet headlines this year.
The former’s exit from Invesco Perpetual in March hit the industry hard, but some have decided to stick with Barnett – a highly established manager in his own right.
We could have gone for a number of comments here, but with passions on the subject very high, we’ve gone for one that acknowledges the expertise of both.
Tiny Clanger: “Never mind the "cautious investor.” What about the people like me who only have three or four years to go before reality kicks in and we have to figure out how we are going to fund our retirement? Buy gold and gold miners now and hope that in three years’ time they will have made a decent profit? Keep buying UK smaller companies in the hope that they will carry on rising? Invest more in bonds and gilts and hope that the doom mongers are wrong?”
“It's alright for the ones who have a long time horizon but it's a flaming nightmare for us who are close to the edge.”
A very important point made by one of our readers, which has encouraged us to look at the needs of those approaching retirement. We will increase the number of stories looking at this issue in 2015.
On behalf of the FE Trustnet team, we wish our readers a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year. We hope to see your comments flowing in 2015 with just as much vigour.
As ever, if there is any area of investment you’d like us to cover in more detail, or if you have a specific story idea, let us know in the comments section below or email us at editorial@financialexpress.net.
