Wave goodbye as with-profits slip off into the sunset

with-profits

The recent better performance of with-profits is due to the investment environment rather than the efficacy of this product, so as new investments emerge with-profits are likely to disappear

A change is taking place in the investment world analogous to the demise of communism that followed the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989. With-profits funds, once a dominant feature of the UK's investment landscape, appear gripped by terminal decline following the post technology, media and telecoms bear market that ravaged equity markets in the early years of this decade. If asked to describe their ideal investment, most people would opt for a diversified portfolio that provides similar returns to equities with lower volatility - a description, in short, of a well managed with-profits fun...