Investors gravitated toward Smith’s “no nonsense buy-and-hold approach,” surmised Bestinvest managing director Jason Hollands.
He added: “The performance has been stellar since launch and the fact that Terry ploughed an additional £115 million of his own spare cash into the fund during the year, taking his personal interest in the fund to over £200 million, is a big vote of confidence in the portfolio of global blue chip companies he holds.”
Neil Woodford’s equity income fund, which has amassed £9.3bn in the two years since launching, was the second favourite among Tilney Bestinvest clients. And given that the latest Investment Association data suggests UK equity funds have fallen out of favour with retail investors, second place in 2016 is quite an achievement, said Hollands.
The love toward UK equities continued with fourth place awarded to Threadneedle’s UK Equity Income fund and fifth and eighth held by two funds in the UK All Companies Sector: Liontrust Special Situations and AXA Framlington UK Select Opportunities.
Stewart Asia Pacific Leaders placed third, in spite of emerging market equities and Asian markets’ shaky start to the year.
Save for North America, Tilney Bestinvest clients also expressed a ‘very clear preference’ for active equity managers across most sectors. The HSBC American Index that follows the S&P 500 index was the most beloved passive fund by Tilney’s clients, taking seventh place.
Despite the prevalence of data citing the popularity of targeted absolute return funds, only one fund fitting that description, the Standard Life GARS fund, made it into Tilney’s list, slotting into tenth place.
Likewise, there was not a single property or fixed income concentrated fund among clients’ ten favourite funds. Although the Vanguard Life Strategy 80% Equity has a 20% fixed income weighting, made up of UK and global bonds, it just missed the top ten, finishing at number twelve.
The full top 15 list is:
