Global graduates: finding the fund managers on the rise

James Thorne

First rated: October 2012

Fund: Threadneedle UK Smaller Cos

Current Citywire rating: A (Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland)

Kicking off this ratings round-up is Threadneedle’s UK small cap specialist James Thorne, who was awarded an A-rating in seven markets last month.

Thorne noted in May that his strong performance in the Equity UK space had been driven by his allocations to technology and engineering. This bias towards these two sectors appears to have held true in his most recent factsheet.

This is most notable in technology, which represents a major overweight in the £119 million (€148 million) fund. At present, Thorne has 14% greater allocation to technology names than his benchmark, the NUMIS NSCI Ex Investment Companies.

Frank Thormann

First rated: September 2012

Fund: UniFavorit: Aktien I

Current Citywire rating: AA (Austria, Germany, Italy, Spain)

Union Investment’s Frank Thormann has been rated for two months now and briefly experienced a AAA-rating in the German market. He is now AA-rated across four of our core markets, these being Austria, Germany, Italy and Spain.

Healthcare was a key driver for Frank Thormann’s performance when he was profiled in May this year. This sector currently represents 15% of the fund’s sector allocation, while IT (20.2%) is the largest area of investment at present.

The major regional allocation for Thormann is the US (51%), while Great Britain (8.9%) and Japan (6.2%) represent the other noteworthy markets the global investor has primarily targeted in his €322 million fund.

Lode Devlaminck

First rated: June 2012

Fund: Hermes Global Equities Selection

Current Citywire rating: Not rated

A tumultuous time for global equity specialist Lode Devlaminck, who debuted with an A-rating in Netherlands and Switzerland in June, lost it for the next two months, briefly regained it in September, before losing it again under the October ratings round-up.

Devlaminck operates a diverse investment approach on the €100.9 million fund, with slight overweights to IT and telecoms, while running underweights in energy and healthcare.

Speaking to Citywire Global in May, Devlaminck said he was beginning to look more closely at the United States. This is currently his largest overweight in terms of country allocation – at 5.92% above his benchmark index, the MSCI AC World Net.

John Bennett

First rated: August 2012

Fund: Henderson European Focus

Current Citywire rating: A-rated (Austria, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland)

Veteran investor John Bennett entered the Citywire ratings in August with an A-rating across all eight of the core markets we cover and has retained this through September and October.

In his Managers to Watch profile, Bennett defined himself as ‘defensive with healthcare’, and this sector remains his most favoured hunting ground.

Healthcare names make up nearly 30% of his sector allocation and he has spoken of a ‘stealth bull market’ emerging in pharmaceutical names.

Also speaking at the end of last month, Bennett, who runs a total of five funds covering Equity Europe and Equity Europe ex UK, said there was a ‘golden opportunity’ for arbitrage created by a lot of investors thinking too short-term with their allocations.

Paul Wild

First rated: October 2012

Fund: JOHCM Continental European

Current Citywire rating: A-rated (Austria, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland)

Rounding off our ratings catch-up this month is J O Hambro Capital Management’s European equity specialist Paul Wild. A relative newcomer in the ratings, Wild received an A-rating across all eight markets covered by Citywire in October.

Wild, who has been lead manager on the €703 million fund since April 2010, has his largest sector allocation to financials. This, however, is a slightly underweight position compared to his benchmark, the FTSE Eurofirst 300 Ex UK TR Index.

At present, the three largest positions in Wild’s 68-stock portfolio are in French pharmaceuticals name Sanofi-Aventis, Swiss banking group Credit Suisse and German software provider SAP AG.