Research houses have put Fidelity’s Global Equities Fund on hold after portfolio manager Brenda Reed was replaced by Amit Lodha.
Reed departed the firm to return to New York and take up a job with hedge fund manager George Weiss Associates.
“During her tenure, the fund has produced good performance results,” Standard & Poor’s (S&P), which previously rated the fund four stars, said.
“While Mr Lodha assumed management responsibility for the fund on 1 October, Ms Reed will remain until the end of October to assist with an orderly handover.”
London-based Lodha has 10 years’ industry experience and has been with Fidelity for seven years.
“We will look to meet with the London-based Fidelity investment team responsible for the management of this product in November as part of our international equities sector review. At that time, we will be looking to resolve the fund’s on hold status,” S&P said.
Lonsec revised the fund’s rating to “fund watch” pending further discussions with Fidelity and the new portfolio manager, the firm’s general manager of research Grant Kennaway said.
Zenith investment analyst Graeme Miller said the research house had reviewed the fund as part of its international equity sector review and the product was not deemed worthy to be part of Zenith’s recommended list.
“The fund failed to meet the threshold for inclusion on our recommended list for a number of reasons, including our concern surrounding the strategy’s heavy reliance on the input of Brenda Reed as portfolio manager,” he said.
“This also contributed to our secondary concern surrounding the relatively high number of stocks that are held in the fund. In Zenith’s opinion, this is a relatively high number to monitor given the bottom-up driven process and reliance on one portfolio manager. It also dilutes potential alpha from any high conviction investment views.
“Zenith will continue to monitor the strategy, and assuming the fund is able to again pass our initial quantitative screens, will be included in next year’s international equity sector review. In the interim, we’ll be looking to touch base with the new portfolio manager, Amit Lodha, some time in December.”
