The New York-based investment manager recorded £2.55bn of gross sales for Q3 2014, capitalising on the growing attractiveness of passive funds for discretionary managers. The majority of sales were in BlackRock’s tracker products. However, despite the strong performance, it resulted in a drop of £874.4m on the previous quarter.
The rest of the top three also remained unchanged from the Q2 results, with M&G and Invesco Perpetual claiming second and third with £2.14bn and £1.88bn of sales respectively.
Fidelity also benefited from a growth in demand for passives, with the charge cut on its index tracker range in May leading to increased retail fund activity, resulting in a move to sixth-highest in the gross Q3 sales tables with £1.58bn worth of inflows.
In the net retail sales rankings Woodford Investment Management and Henderson Global Investors occupied first and second on £1.15bn (estimate) and £795.1m respectively, followed by BlackRock with £689.5m. Henderson in particular fared well, recording a 12% increase on the previous quarter.
7IM was a new entrant in the table, lifted by a solid performance of the 7IM Asset Allocated Passive Balanced fund. Premier Asset Management and Fundsmith also profited from investors’ desire to diversify, in eighth and ninth-place with £233.9m and £168.9m respectively.
Pridham attributed the success of Woodford, 7IM, Premier and Fundsmith to the lack of mature business on their books.
After a strong summer for net investment across the board following the raising of the annual ISA allowance, market volatility edged advisers and wealth managers towards a more cautious approach going into autumn.
|
Top ten managers by gross retail sales in Q3 2014 (£m) |
Top ten managers by net retail sales in Q3 2014 (£m) |
|---|---|
| 1 BlackRock £2,549.3 | 1 Woodford Inv £1,150.0(e) |
| 2 M&G £2,144.9 | 2 Henderson £795.1 |
| 3 Invesco Perpetual £1,880.4 | 3 BlackRock £689.5 |
| 4 Henderson £1,845.8 | 4 Artemis £487.6 |
| 5 Standard Life Inv £1,716.8 | 5 Standard Life Inv £470.8 |
| 6 Fidelity £1,586.3 | 6 HSBC Global Asset Mgmt £357.0 |
| 7 Schroders £1,559.9 | 7 7IM £259.9 |
| 8 Artemis £1,262.9 | 8 Premier Asset Management £233.9 |
| 9 Jupiter £1,254.9 | 9 Fundsmith £168.9 |
| 10 BNY Mellon £1,244 | 10 Old Mutual Global Investors £134 |
Source: Pridham Report, (e) estimate
