Morningstar has placed CFSGAM's Australian core equities strategy 'under review' following what the ratings agency described as "a major overhaul of [the CFSGAM] Australian Share Core investment team, with the majority being made redundant".
Three senior members of the Australian Share Core strategy at CFSGAM – Matt Reynolds, Jacqueline Fernley, and Kim Tracey – will be kept on temporarily to transition the assets to other strategies.
Three members of the equity income team (Rudi Minbatiwala, Jason Moodie, and Marlon Chanwill) will remain in the business, while the remainder of the team have left.
Strategies directly affected by the closure include the CFS Equity Income and CFS Target Return Income strategies.
Morningstar has also placed the CFS Wholesale Global Resources strategy under review after the fund manager announced it would exit the strategy.
"CFSGAM’s reasoning behind the closure of the strategy is decreasing investor demand," said Morningstar in a note to subscribers.
"As the outcome remains highly uncertain, we place this strategy under review until we have more details," said the note.
"While these events are occurring, the investment team is being overhauled with Todd Warren (head of global resources), Tal Lomnitzer (deputy head), and Peter
Campbell (senior analyst – mining, energy and steel) remaining with CFSGAM until the exit is complete.
"However, the other members of the CFS Wholesale Global Resources investment team (including Rebecca O’Dwyer and Peter Mangano) have been made redundant and will leave the business immediately."
