Clarity Funds Management has added two new portfolio investment entity (PIE) products to its range, covering NZ and global equities.
As flagged here in August, Clarity PIEd-up a fund managed by the storied Los Angeles-headquartered Capital Group, which looks after some NZ$3 trillion. Clarity, part of the Investment Services Group (ISG), filed the paperwork on the PIE version of the Capital Group New Perspective Fund last week in a deal that doubles the global share funds under its legal banner.
MFS, another long-established US-based international equities manager, also sits in the Clarity suite after receiving the PIE treatment in 2017. As at the end of June, the MFS-managed Clarity global shares fund boasted almost $110 million in the PIE.
Richard O’Brien, ISG chief, said Clarity was “deliberate and selective in the investment firms we elect to partner with”.
“We were drawn to the Capital Group New Perspective Fund by the impressive track record over an extended period (more than 40 years) and the quality and rigour of the investment process,” O’Brien said. “We believe that the addition of the Clarity – Capital Group New Perspective Fund will further strengthen our offering to clients, and indeed have been encouraged by the initial feedback from clients and other stakeholders.”
But in addition to the Capital fund, Clarity last week launched a new NZ shares fund that plays to the strengths of recently-appointed chief investment officer, Josh Wilson. Wilson joined the group as CIO this April following an eight-year career with NZ Funds Management in charge of Australasian shares.
O’Brien said the NZ Equity Fund would target local equities only rather than the Australasian mandate of the manager’s Dividend Yield and Trans-Tasman products (the latter has also been renamed as the Trans-Tasman Value Fund).
“The new fund reflects Josh’s track record in managing NZ shares,” O’Brien said.
He said the firm would consider adding more funds to its PIE range over time.
“We’re open to other funds,” O’Brien said. “But we don’t have a pre-determined number of funds or asset classes that we’d like to add. We will continue to evaluate the opportunities that become available to us according to their individual merits”
In total, Clarity manages about $530 million in its now eight funds (including two diversified products that feed into the other PIEs).
Also last month, Clarity went live with the ‘world first’ Māori-values wholesale Australasian equities fund, Tahito. The Tahito fund, first mooted last year, follows a “unique way of measuring companies using Māori ancestral knowledge combined with conventional financial analysis”, according to founder, Temuera Hall.
Hall said the Tahito fund targets wholesale “investors who want competitive market returns but equally would like to see their capital applied to a high ethical standard, and in investments that are making a positive social and environmental impact”.
Tahito applies “ethical screens derived from Māori indigenous values” that focus on “the connection and interrelationship of all things”, he said.
The fund, which Wilson also helps manage, has already attracted some seed investors with more expected to follow soon.
Clarity uses MMC for administration, BNP Paribas as custodian and Guardian Trust as supervisor.
Previously known as JMIS Investment Management, Clarity’s ISG sister brands include Devon Funds, JMI Wealth and Select (the discretionary investment management service – DIMS – platform purchased from Sovereign in 2015). ISG manages more than $5.5 billion across the group.