Performance is key to better situation
Just over a week from now, investment giant Fidelity will unveil the name of the fund manager who has the unenviable task of taking over from the legendary Anthony Bolton.
After 29 years of running the hugely successful Special Situations fund, Bolton will relinquish control, though the final handing over of the £3bn fund will not take place until the end of the year.
It is a key appointment for Fidelity. Since the group, in preparation for Bolton's grand departure, split the original Special Situations fund down the middle last September, with Bolton keeping half and the other being run on a global basis by Jorma Korhonen, Fidelity has lurched from crisis to crisis.
Many financial advisers, upset over the dismantling of the original Special Situations fund and annoyed over the drawn-out nature of Bolton's departure, have withdrawn their clients' money from Fidelity. This outflow has been perpetuated by the indifferent performance of many of its core, actively managed investment funds.
While Special Situations has hardly set the world alight over the past year, its record looks positively sparkling when set against the continued performance dross being handed out by the manager of Fidelity UK Growth. Over the past year, this fund has turned £1,000 into a measly £1,009.
By way of comparison, the average UK investment fund has turned £1,000 into £1,058 while the Fidelity Moneybuilder UK Index tracker fund - a fund where no active manager is involved - has turned £1,000 into £1,101.
Over the same period, the relative performance of Fidelity Growth & Income, Fidelity Income Plus, Fidelity American and Fidelity European are nothing to shout about. Brian Dennehy, one of the country's leading financial advisers, describes Fidelity as 'a drifting investment ship'. He is spot on, and he is not alone.
Financial Mail was contacted last week by a senior Fidelity manager - not a fund manager - of almost ten years' standing who works at the company's administrative headquarters near Tonbridge, Kent.
Our Fidelity mole described a 'siege panic mentality' in the organisation that is reaching down to all levels - and all resulting from the group's poor fund performance.
He also detailed a plan among Fidelity executives to move away from its dependence on discerning financial advisers by establishing a tied salesforce whose job would be to sell Fidelity funds. The launch date of this 'adviser club', according to our insider, is early next year.
Fidelity's launch of its series of new retirement funds seems to be a step in this direction. Set up to provide a home for investors' long-term savings with specific retirement dates in mind, these funds will change their asset mix to reflect the ageing of their underlying investors. As a result, they do away with the need for an investor to seek advice from an adviser on asset allocation.
Though these funds are an interesting development, they are no more than a smokescreen to the problems facing Fidelity.
What it needs to do more than anything else is to get its performance numbers back up to scratch - ASAP. Do this and investors - and even financial advisers - will fall back in love with it.
In one of the lowest key financial launches of the year to date, the Retirement & Care Faculty was born late last month. Its creation was met with little fanfare, though I am told there was a launch party with Baroness Greengross, former director-general of Age Concern, saying a few words of support. Financial Mail did not get an invitation, though we won't hold that against them.
The idea behind the faculty, launched by the Chartered Insurance Institute, is a good one. It will draw together all of the independent financial advisers currently specialisingin the key areas of retirement planning - from long-term care through to equity release - and ensure they are best equipped to provide quality advice.
Only advisers with relevant qualifications in retirement and care financial planning will be allowed to join the R&CF.
Nowhere is the need for premier financial advice more important than in the over-65s market, especially when you consider the fact that by 2031 more than 5.5m people will be aged over 65 and 2.3m will be over 80. Too many people are being left to fend for themselves, unaware that there exist financial specialists who spend every working minute giving out retirement advice.
The price of this ignorance can often result in the purchase of a poor value equity-release plan or even the loss of the home. No one should seek advice on longterm care or equity release in the future without ensuring that the person in front of them is wearing an R&CF badge of honour.
Most watched Money videos
- Mail Online takes a tour of Gatwick's modern EV charging station
- How to invest for income and growth: SAINTS' James Dow
- MailOnline asks Lexie Limitless 5 quick fire EV road trip questions
- 'Now even better': Nissan Qashqai gets a facelift for 2024 version
- Tesla unveils new Model 3 Performance - it's the fastest ever!
- Mercedes has finally unveiled its new electric G-Class
- Land Rover unveil newest all-electric Range Rover SUV
- Leapmotor T03 is set to become Britain's cheapest EV from 2025
- Mini Cooper SE: The British icon gets an all-electric makeover
- Blue Whale fund manager on the best of the Magnificent 7
- A look inside the new Ineos Quartermaster off-road pickup truck
- Mini celebrates the release of brand new all-electric car Mini Aceman
- CITY WHISPERS: Boss Cook-ing up a big sparkler to woo De...
- St James's Place facing humiliating exit from FTSE 100
- Sales at Bloomsbury soar thanks to the craze for...
- Revealed: The seven pensions savings habits that could...
- How to invest in the Ozempic weight loss boom - and pile...
- How does Shein make £2bn profit selling clothes from just...
- How can the UK catch back up with the US? HAMISH MCRAE
- Coca-Cola HBC's boss pocketed more than £320,000 in 'cost...
- Pressure on IMF to change gloomy forecast as Britain...
- Meet the foul-mouthed, Left-wing, working-class ex-City...
- Nationwide set to hand Fairer Share bonus worth £350m to...
- Former LV boss Mark Hartigan cashing in again as he tries...
- CQS NATURAL RESOURCES GROWTH AND INCOME: Golden...
- I've spent 36 years matchmaking the rich - what I've...
- Why did Barclays freeze our Neighbourhood Watch bank...
- JEFF PRESTRIDGE: Cash access is still so crucial to the...
- Where it REALLY pays to own a holiday buy-to-let: How to...
- Tesla's chairman dismisses as 'c**p' claims she is too...