Ninety One's Stopford and Borbora-Sheen to take on £1.1bn Cautious Managed fund
Managed by Alastair Mundy before leave of absence last month
Ninety One's multi-asset team will assume responsibility for the firm’s £1.1bn Cautious Managed fund, following manager Alastair Mundy’s leave of absence last month.
The fund, which has temporarily been managed by members of Ninety One's value team Alessandro Dicorrado and Steve Woolley since Mundy's departure, will now be headed up by John Stopford and Jason Borbora-Sheen, who have been named managers of the firm's £1.3bn multi-asset Diversified Income portfolio since 2012 and 2019 respectively and closely worked on the strategy since Borbora-Sheen joined the firm in 2015.
Ninety One Cautious Managed, which resides in the IA Mixed Investment 20%-60% Shares sector, will retain its current equity weighting of approximately 58% and its broad exposure to fixed income assets will remain the same.
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However, its yield will increase from approximately 2% to 4%, which the managers will seek to obtain through a more diversified equity portfolio of higher-yielding stocks, alongside a greater focus on investment-grade credit within its fixed income allocation.
Richard Garland, managing director, global adviser at Ninety One, said "a huge amount of work" was undertaken to ensure the portfolio was handed over to the best-suited fund managers, in a move that "really considered shareholders and ensured they will be placed in the right hands."
"John and Jason have done an excellent job of managing Ninety One's Diversified Income fund - one of our flagship vehicles. Since 2012, it has achieved an average yield of 4.6% and has never had a down year," he explained.
"Cautious Managed will be run in a similar way to this, except it resides in the 20%-60% Shares sector as opposed to the 0%-35% Shares sector. The only noticeable difference within the fund compared to how it was managed before will be its higher yield, which we think is a positive for investors."
He added: "The managers are supported by a team of 21 cross-asset specialists, which means they are well positioned to meet the Cautious Managed fund's income and growth objectives."
The fund aims to return at least 4% more than the UK Consumer Price index per year net of fees over rolling five-year periods.
On 17 April, it was announced that Alastair Mundy would take leave of absence from Ninety One and all portfolio management responsibilities due to health reasons.
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