Our Investment Managers
ClearView provides you with access to a number of investment managers. Each one is carefully selected for their expertise in a particular asset class.
We understand that no single investment manager will be the best performer in all asset classes, or all markets, all of the time. For example: some investment managers are experts in Australian shares, while others are experts in fixed interest assets.
Asset Class | Investment Manager |
|---|---|
| Australian Shares | |
| Global Listed Infrastructure | |
| International Shares | |
| Emerging Markets | |
| Listed Property | |
| International Fixed Interest | |
| Australian Fixed Interest | |
| Cash |
Australian Shares
Plato Investment Management
Plato Investment Management ('Plato') is an Australian owned, quantitative, boutique fund manager within the Pinnacle Investment Management Group.
Plato applies a disciplined and active quantitative investment management approach to Australian Equities with the aim of delivering consistent investment outperformance over rolling 3 to 5 year periods. Plato's experienced investment team is committed to rigorous research and innovation in its quantitative methodologies.
Plato's investment philosophy is based on the premise that markets are less than perfectly efficient and that investor behavioural biases lie behind this inefficiency. Plato’s quantitative process utilises a combination of value, momentum and quality factors which can exploit these market inefficiencies.
Within the ClearView Australian Shares Fund, Plato is used as an ‘enhanced index’ Australian equities manager. Essentially, this means that Plato starts portfolio construction with the ASX 200 (the top 200 stocks listed on the ASX by market capitalisation) as the base position. Plato then uses its quantitative investment process to take (relatively small) tilts away from this base position so as to ‘enhance’ the otherwise index return.
Schroder Investment Management Australia Limited
Schroders plc is a publicly listed UK company with a history in banking and finance dating back over 200 years. It is one of the largest and most internationally diverse independent investment managers providing investment management, research and marketing services from offices located in 26 countries. In Australia, Schroder Investment Management Australia Limited (Schroders) is a wholly owned subsidiary of Schroders plc. Established in Australia since 1961 Schroders offers a range of investment products including global and domestic equities, fixed income and multi-asset strategies. As at 31 December 2011 Schroders in Australia managed A$27.4 billion.
ClearView has negotiated an exclusive mandate with Schroders to invest alongside Schroders staff in their high conviction, Schroder Equity Opportunities Fund. Investing in a broad range of Australian stocks this Fund focuses on quality stocks, that is, those with a sustainable competitive advantage over the long term. The Fund is not constrained by capitalisation weights of a benchmark such as the S&P/ASX 200 and invests in stocks considered to offer the best long term opportunities with portfolio weights determined on merit.
GLOBAL LISTED INFRASTRUCTURE
Colonial First State Global Asset Management
Colonial First State Global Asset Management (CFSGAM) is the consolidated asset
management division of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. CFSGAM is Australia’s largest asset manager of Australian-sourced funds and manages more than $119 billion across a diverse range of asset classes including Australian and global shares; cash, fixed interest and credit’ property securities, hedge funds, direct property, private equity, infrastructure and global resources.
The global listed infrastructure team is a specialist group of investment professionals focusing solely on listed infrastructure whilst drawing on the resources of the greater CSFAM organisation. ClearView have invested in a discrete mandate with CFSAM that focuses on listed infrastructure in developed economies (ClearView has a separate approach for investing in emerging economies). This sector offers investors a reasonably conservative way to invest in listed equities. Infrastructure assets often provide essential services such as water, power, or electricity. As such, they are often highly regulated and relatively insensitive to changes in the economic cycle. This form of relatively stable growth investment is used in ClearView products to add diversity when combined with other forms of equity investing. Listed infrastructure is particularly suitable for superannuation investors who need growth investments with good risk controls.
INTERNATIONAL SHARES
Franklin Templeton Investments
Franklin Templeton Investments (Templeton) is one of the largest independent fund management groups in the world. The group's business is investment management, and the parent company is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (BEN) and is a constituent of the S&P 500 Index.
Templeton's global equity investment philosophy has been consistently implemented for over 60 years and seeks value in all corners of the world using a global industry focus and a long-term investment horizon. The Templeton investment process is built on a rigorous, bottom-up approach that examines the traditional measures of value, with emphasis on a company's current price relative to its long-term, future earnings potential. Investment professionals are located throughout the world in seven local offices, including two investment professionals based in Melbourne. Templeton has managed assets for clients in Australia and New Zealand since 1987.
MFS Investment Management
MFS Investment Management (MFS) is a subsidiary of Sun Life Assurance Company of Canada and is America's oldest mutual fund organisation with a history of money management dating from 1924. In 1932, MFS established an internal equity research department and proprietary research approach. MFS has since grown to be one of the most respected names in investment management.
State Street Global Advisors
State Street Global Advisors (State Street) is the second largest fund manager in the world (in terms of assets under management), headquartered in Boston, USA. Their Australian arm is based in Sydney. State Street is institutionally focused which means you, as a retail investor, can not access their institutional funds directly.
A big part of State Street’s capability is in passive investing. Passive investing is premised on the idea that it is difficult to beat the market and that, after fees, it is hard for fund managers to add value by actively trying to pick stocks. Therefore, or so the theory goes, it is better to just passively mimic a market’s index. E.g. if BHP makes up 13% of the ASX 300, for example, then a passively managed fund which is benchmarked to the ASX 300 would also hold 13%. If tomorrow, continuing the example, the price of BHP falls, meaning it now makes up 12.9% of the ASX 300, then the passively managed fund would sell enough BHP shares so as to also hold 12.9% of its portfolio in BHP.
As passive investing does not require the employment of large teams of analysts and portfolio managers it is cheaper than active investing. At ClearView we use State Street in International Shares, Listed Property, Australian Fixed Interest and Cash.
T. Rowe Price International Ltd
T. Rowe Price International Ltd (T. Rowe Price), founded in 2000, is a global investment management firm headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, USA and with offices worldwide. T. Rowe Price is a wholly owned subsidiary of the T. Rowe Price Group Inc., an independent public holding company, founded in 1937. T. Rowe Price manages investments in all major asset classes. As of 31 December 2011 the T. Rowe Price Group of companies had AUD $477.5 billion under management.
T. Rowe Price’s disciplined, risk-aware investment approach focuses on diversification, style consistency, and fundamental research. Proprietary research is at the core of T. Rowe Price’s investment approach together with its emphasis on long-term investment merit. It supports a global network of analysts with its proprietary analytics and state-of-the-art technologies.
EMERGING MARKETS
RARE Infrastructure
RARE Infrastructure (RARE) is a boutique investment manager that invests solely in listed infrastructure in both developed and emerging markets. The RARE team is comprised of 13 highly experienced specialist global infrastructure investment professionals with a combined 120+ years of experience in global infrastructure and 80+ years in funds management and are one of the pioneers of investing in this field. ClearView chose to invest in emerging markets through a very specialised emerging market listed infrastructure fund with RARE, rather than a more conventional emerging market investment. One of the big issues with investing in emerging markets from an Australian investor’s perspective is that there is a large risk that one is doubling up rather than diversifying investments. For example, an investment in Chinese shares (which form part of emerging markets) and investments in Australian resource companies such as BHP or RIO may have their investment returns driven by exactly the same set of factors, as China is the world’s biggest buyer of resources. By investing in a subset of the broader emerging markets such as listed infrastructure, that have different risk characteristics to the broader emerging markets asset class, ClearView seeks to mitigate this risk. Listed infrastructure in emerging markets is more defensive and less cyclical than are most emerging market investments. Listed infrastructure should be more driven by what is happening in the domestic economy in developing countries than global cyclical growth.
LISTED PROPERTY
State Street Global Advisors
State Street Global Advisors (State Street) is the second largest fund manager in the world (in terms of assets under management), headquartered in Boston, USA. Their Australian arm is based in Sydney. State Street is institutionally focused which means you, as a retail investor, can not access their institutional funds directly.
A big part of State Street’s capability is in passive investing. Passive investing is premised on the idea that it is difficult to beat the market and that, after fees, it is hard for fund managers to add value by actively trying to pick stocks. Therefore, or so the theory goes, it is better to just passively mimic a market’s index. E.g. if BHP makes up 13% of the ASX 300, for example, then a passively managed fund which is benchmarked to the ASX 300 would also hold 13%. If tomorrow, continuing the example, the price of BHP falls, meaning it now makes up 12.9% of the ASX 300, then the passively managed fund would sell enough BHP shares so as to also hold 12.9% of its portfolio in BHP.
As passive investing does not require the employment of large teams of analysts and portfolio managers it is cheaper than active investing. At ClearView we use State Street in International Shares, Listed Property, Australian Fixed Interest and Cash.
INTERNATIONAL FIXED INTEREST
PIMCO
PIMCO is one of the largest global investment solutions providers in the world, with more than AU$1.2 trillion in assets under management and more than 2,000 employees in offices around the world. In Australia, PIMCO manages over AU$32 billion on behalf of a broad range of clients, including institutional corporations and superannuation funds to financial planners and individual investors. PIMCO Australia Pty Ltd was established in 1998.
PIMCO has a team of dedicated client servicing investment professionals which allows their portfolio managers to focus on returns. They have enjoyed a stable organisation throughout its 40-year history, and have retained key professionals throughout this time. Many of the professionals who were instrumental in PIMCO's founding and subsequent growth are still active in its management.
AUSTRALIAN FIXED INTEREST
Aberdeen Asset Management
Aberdeen Asset Management Limited (Aberdeen) is a wholly-owned, Australian-based subsidiary of Aberdeen Asset Management PLC, a UK-based global asset management group.
Aberdeen’s business is the active management of financial assets, chiefly equities, fixed income and property. Aberdeen invests worldwide, following a predominantly long-only approach, based on fundamentally sound investments.
The Group has offices in 24 countries around the world. It has had a presence in Australia since December 2000, growing organically and by acquisition since that time.
ClearView has negotiated an investment mandate with Aberdeen for the ClearView Fixed Interest Fund. Aberdeen will aim to add value by exploiting market inefficiencies in interest rates, currency, investment grade credit, emerging market debt, high yield, convertibles and money markets. Their investment structure enables them to not only follow a disciplined investment process but to also be flexible and manage portfolios for a wide variety of client requirements. This may range from strategies which employ multiple sources of uncorrelated returns to those that are focused on a particular specialist area.
State Street Global Advisors
State Street Global Advisors (State Street) is the second largest fund manager in the world (in terms of assets under management), headquartered in Boston, USA. Their Australian arm is based in Sydney. State Street is institutionally focused which means you, as a retail investor, can not access their institutional funds directly.
A big part of State Street’s capability is in passive investing. Passive investing is premised on the idea that it is difficult to beat the market and that, after fees, it is hard for fund managers to add value by actively trying to pick stocks. Therefore, or so the theory goes, it is better to just passively mimic a market’s index. E.g. if BHP makes up 13% of the ASX 300, for example, then a passively managed fund which is benchmarked to the ASX 300 would also hold 13%. If tomorrow, continuing the example, the price of BHP falls, meaning it now makes up 12.9% of the ASX 300, then the passively managed fund would sell enough BHP shares so as to also hold 12.9% of its portfolio in BHP.
As passive investing does not require the employment of large teams of analysts and portfolio managers it is cheaper than active investing. At ClearView we use State Street in International Shares, Listed Property, Australian Fixed Interest and Cash.
CASH
State Street Global Advisors
State Street Global Advisors (State Street) is the second largest fund manager in the world (in terms of assets under management), headquartered in Boston, USA. Their Australian arm is based in Sydney. State Street is institutionally focused which means you, as a retail investor, can not access their institutional funds directly.
A big part of State Street’s capability is in passive investing. Passive investing is premised on the idea that it is difficult to beat the market and that, after fees, it is hard for fund managers to add value by actively trying to pick stocks. Therefore, or so the theory goes, it is better to just passively mimic a market’s index. E.g. if BHP makes up 13% of the ASX 300, for example, then a passively managed fund which is benchmarked to the ASX 300 would also hold 13%. If tomorrow, continuing the example, the price of BHP falls, meaning it now makes up 12.9% of the ASX 300, then the passively managed fund would sell enough BHP shares so as to also hold 12.9% of its portfolio in BHP.
As passive investing does not require the employment of large teams of analysts and portfolio managers it is cheaper than active investing. At ClearView we use State Street in International Shares, Listed Property, Australian Fixed Interest and Cash.
