Despite a 49% increase in outflows and a 73% fall, as a result, in net new business, RLAM´s head of distribution Rob Williams, told Portfolio Adviser, the firm has a lot of plans for 2016.
¨We will be launching a range of six risk-controlled multi-asset funds for the team led by Trevor Greetham,¨ Williams confirmed, ¨and to support that we will be building out our distribution arm.¨
The firm is also planning a few other fund launches for later in the year including a new absolute return bond fund.
On the staffing front, Williams said the search for a replacement for head of wholesale sales, Ian Goulsbra, who left the firm in August last year, continues apace.
¨We expect to announce something pretty soon on that,¨ he said.
Results
For the full year 2015, the firm reported total net inflows of £532m, 73% lower than the £2bn reported for the full year to end 2014. The fall was driven by a 49% increase in gross outflows from £1.8bn to £2.6bn and a 16% decline in gross inflows from £3.8bn to £3.1bn.
According to Williams, while the numbers were down, in the context of the macro environment and the general level of redemptions being experienced by its peers, RLAM was pretty pleased that, at an overall level. flows were still positive.
This sentiment was echoed by Royal London group CEO, Phil Loney, who was quoted in the news release saying: ¨In a very difficult market for all asset managers and platforms, Royal London Asset Management and Ascentric both had a good year.
¨Both businesses achieved strong gross sales performance and maintained commendable year on year new net asset performance. This was achieved despite the increasing volatility of markets, and changing investor risk appetites, which have left several of our fund management competitors facing net outflows.”
One of the more pleasing aspects of the inflows, said Williams was the strong performance of its fixed income franchises.
¨We continue to see really strong flows into credit bond funds and saw strong increases at both the gross and net level into our fixed income funds,”he said, adding that one of the strongest performers was the firm´s short duration high yield bond fund.
In terms of outflows, Williams said in the firm´s wholesale business, the redemptions profile was a pretty normal spread across the range. On the institutional side, there was a larger discrepancy.
¨2015 saw a return to a more normalised pattern of redemptions after what was a very strong 2013 and 2014. In those two years we had very strong gross inflows and a very low level of redemptions,¨ he said.
Adding: ¨In 2015, we saw the normalisation of the institutional book as some of our clients looked to de-risk their portfolios.¨
Looking forward, Williams says he is cautiously positive.
¨We are not seeing wild swings in flows at present, but we are also not seeing people queuing up to invest in risky assets.¨
