He will be replaced by Wouter Volckaert, who has recently joined Henderson from Morgan Stanley. At Morgan Stanley Volckaert managed concentrated and diversified global equity portfolios for institutional and retail investors. He has also worked at ABN AMRO Asset Managament as a global equity portfolio manager.
O'Neill will remain as part of the Henderson's specialist Global Equities team, led by Matthew Beesley. The group said there would be an orderly transfer of responsibilities and continuity of investment approach.
Wouter holds a masters degree in economics from the University of Leuven (Belgium), studied at London Business School and is a CFA Charterholder. He is fluent in Dutch English and French.
The trust currently sits 18th out of 33 funds in the Global Growth sector over five years, having delivered an NAV return of 89.5%. Over three years, the trust has lagged the wider sector, rising 17.7% against a sector average of 25.6%. the trust had its strongest years in 2008, 2009 and 2012, but has been held back by a weak performance for the year to date in 2013. The group says that the trust's 'low risk' approach has hurt in buoyant markets.
The trust changed its investment objectives in May. Shareholders approved a switch to a single benchmark, the MSCI All Country World Index, and a change in investment policy to focus on global growth but on a total return basis.