Barings Reshuffles GEM Team Following Departures

FUND TIMES: Syme and Wimborne's defection to JO Hambro has forced Barings to shuffle its teams, plus more top news from the week

Holly Cook 11 February, 2011 | 12:23PM
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Baring’s Emerging Markets Losses Are JO Hambro’s Gains
The departure of James Syme from his position as Baring Asset Management’s head of emerging markets equities team, in favour of a new appointment with JO Hambro Capital Management, has forced Barings to reshuffle its flagship emerging markets team. Syme is joined at JO Hambro by fellow Barings colleague Paul Wimborne—the two are to assist JO Hambro in launching a new emerging markets offering that will supposedly differ from its current JOHCM Emerging Markets fund.

Barings announced this week that Syme will be replaced by Roberto Lampl, who has been heading up its Latin American equities team since his move from ING Investment Management in March of last year. Lampl will be assisted by Mark Julio, a current member of Barings’ emerging markets team.

Though the changes are effective immediately, Syme and Wimborne will oversee the handover, while Lampl will continue to run the Barings Latin America Fund as well as taking on the Emerging Markets Fund formerly run by Wimborne.

Morningstar’s OBSR analysts have withdrawn their former A rating on the Barings Global Emerging Markets fund following news of Syme and Wimborne’s departures and will meet with Lampl in the coming months to discuss his plans for the fund.

Fat Figures for Fund of Funds
The popularity of fund of funds is gaining momentum, as shown by figures from the IMA this week that highlight a record level of net retail sales of £6.8 billion in 2010. Assets invested in fund of funds now equate to approximately 10% of total funds under management, according to the IMA.

Balanced funds made up the bulk (59%) of the $58.2 billion of total assets managed by fund of funds at the end of 2010, but tracker funds have also gained in popularity and saw net retail sales of £1.2 billion last year, while the financial crisis appears to have nudged investors’ moral considerations and led to an 80% annual surge in net retail sales of ethical funds to £280 million.

Net retail sales of funds of funds in 2010 reached a record level of £6.8bn, the IMA has said, with gross retail sales now accounting for £1 in every £8 invested in funds.

New ‘Absolute Return’ Currency Offerings
Schroders last week launched two absolute return currency funds, USD- and EUR-denominated classes of the Schroder ISF Absolute Return Currency fund. The funds, which are UCITS III compliant with daily liquidity, aim to deliver low-risk, cash-plus returns from actively managed currency portfolios to both retail and institutional investors. Schroders’ head of currencies, Clive Dennis, is joined by Hardeep Dogra in managing the funds; they will use both long and short exposures and over 30 different currencies.

The spotlight was also on Schroders this week amid news head of multi-manager Andrew Yeadon has left the company following changes to its multi-manager and multi-asset teams, which are to be rolled into one. Johanna Kyrklund, manager of the Schroder Diversified Target fund, will head up the new combined team.

Schroders isn’t the first fund house to make changes to its multi-manager teams. Last week Henderson’s Mark Harris and Craig Heron departed the firm as it merged its multi-manager funds.

The Trojan Horse is Full
Troy Asset Management CEO Sebastian Lyon is to soft close his Trojan Fund from April 30, pending FSA approval, as asset swell sees the fund’s assets under management head towards £1 billion. To buy into the fund, which Lyon has managed since its inception in July 2007, prospective clients will need to invest at least £250,000 and will be charged an additional initial charge of 5% to do so.

Troy also this week announced a management re-jig, with non-executive director Jan Pethick set to succeed Simon de Zoete as Chairman in July and James Findlay, CEO of Findlay Park, appointed as a non-executive director.

Findlay Focusses Further Up the Capitalisation Ladder
James Findlay had his own news to announce this week. Findlay Park’s flagship fund, the soft-closed American Smaller Companies, which has been managed by James Findlay and his team since its launch in March 2004, is changing its name to Findlay Park American fund to reflect its change in investment objective which will see the managers broaden its focus to mid-cap companies as well as small caps. The fund will continue to invest primarily in the Americas (the U.S., Canada and Latin America).

First State Builds Up Property Team
First State Investments has added to its Global Property Securities team with the appointment of Marco Van Bussel as portfolio manager. Van Bussel will report to Andrew Nicholas, head of the global property securities team, which manages the First State Global Property Securities fund.

Ignis Take Steps to Fuel UK Funds
Ignis Asset Management has halved the size of its UK equities team following a review of UK fund performance by new CIO Mark Lovett. UK equities analyst Stacey Cassidy has joined Ignis’s Asia team but the remaining four, including team head Neil Richardson, as well as Finlay MacDonald, Gary McAleese and John Stewart, remain in talks regarding their future positions.

Replacements on the UK equities team are to be announced in due course and Mark Lovett is to manage one of the Ignis UK equities fund offerings himself.

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Holly Cook

Holly Cook  is Manager, Morningstar EMEA Websites

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