Recognises excellence in the sales, marketing and distribution of externally managed investment products. While new inflow represents a key consideration in the assessment of distributor of the year, it is also an assessment of fund retention (an often overlooked sales metric) and quality of information flow, documentation and service to both Zenith and its financial adviser clients.
Winner: Macquarie Professional Series
Zenith says: Macquarie Professional Series continues to be the benchmark in external distribution businesses with its expanding, yet exceptionally high-quality suite of externally managed funds, now across the majority of asset classes. Information provision, access to the external manager investment professionals and effective education and communication of manager strategies and ongoing updates remain of the highest quality. Finally, a well-resourced and experienced sales team with extensive knowledge of the product suite combines to make Macquarie Professional Series a worthy winner of the category.
Interview:
Macquarie Professional Series has distribution relationships with five funds managers, most recently signing Los Angeles-based quantitative manager Analytic Investors.
Adrian Stewart, head of Macquarie Professional Series and wholesale distribution for Macquarie Investment Management, says the group has visited around 600 funds managers in the past nine years to find the best managers with proven, durable, well-crafted processes.
“It is an honour to win this award again, given the competition was so strong; and we take this seriously because it recognises our discerning model,” he says.
“We search the world for differentiated strategies to bring to the marketplace and it’s nice to be recognised. We’re patient in our approach because we want long-term relationships that will last at least 5 to 10 years.”
Stewart says competition in the third-party marketing and distribution space has intensified in the past few years. He estimates there are more than 70 third-party marketers in Australia, including eight large institutionally aligned groups. The majority of the rest are institutional sales managers representing a single manager.
Macquarie Professional Series has raised more than $6 billion in assets under management for Walter Scott & Partners, Winton Capital Management, Independent Franchise Partners and Arrowstreet. The group has raised more than $25 million on behalf of Analytic Investors since August 2012.
“It’s early days for Analytic Investors and the first year has been about gaining ratings from research houses and getting on platforms, so we’re pleased with what we’ve achieved so far,” Stewart says.
– Leng Yeow
Finalists:
– Bennelong Funds Management
– Fidante Partners
