Standard Life Investments mutual fund sales break the £1bn mark
20 November 2006
Leading fund manager, Standard Life Investments, is experiencing its strongest year for mutual fund sales since the launch of the company in 1998, with gross inflows breaking the £1bn barrier for the first time at £1,210.8m (as at 30th September 2006).
Net inflows for the same period also reached their strongest levels at £920m.
Gross sales increased from £143m (Q3 2005) to £328m (Q3 2006) representing a 129% increase during the equivalent periods. This compares favourably with the average industry increase of 12.4% (IMA Q3 figures, from £18,630.5m to £20,936.9m). Standard Life Investments net sales over the quarter increased by 237% compared with the industry average increase of 8.9% (SLI Q3 figures, from £70.1m to £236m/IMA, £4,247.4m to £4,624.5m).
Top selling OEICs in the third quarter of 2006 were the Select Property, UK Equity High Income, UK Opportunities, Higher Income and UK Smaller Companies funds. The top selling funds for the same period last year were the UK Equity High Income, UK Opportunities, Higher Income, Corporate Bond and the AAA Income funds.
Jacqueline Kerr, Head of Mutual Fund Investments at Standard Life Investments, said: “Sales are driven by performance, so the fact that the UK Smaller Companies Fund, managed by award winning fund manager, Harry Nimmo, has joined the five top selling funds for the period shows that investors have recognised the fund’s top decile performance achieved over the year to date, one year and two years.
“Our UK Equity range continues to perform particularly strongly with six funds rated ‘A’ or above by Standard & Poor’s and producing top quartile returns over one, two and three years. The latest addition to our mutual fund range, the UK Equity Unconstrained Fund, has also produced excellent returns since being launched in September 2005. Now being actively marketed to retail investors the fund, which ranks number one in the IMA UK All Companies sector, has returned over 51% since launch – a figure which is representative of over double that achieved by the FTSE All Share and by its peer group, the IMA UK All Companies Sector.
“With such an outstanding performance witnessed across the width of our mutual fund range, I am confident that we will continue to produce both performance and service levels our investors can be proud of. Thank you to all intermediaries and discretionary managers who continue to help us make investors aware of our success.”
