Flows into OEICs slow

Funds flow into tax-effective United Kingdom-based Open Ended Investment Companies (OEICs) fell off sharply in the December quarter.

Thursday, February 7th 2002, 11:02PM

Funds flow into tax-effective United Kingdom-based Open Ended Investment Companies (OEICs) fell off sharply in the December quarter, according to the latest Good Returns' survey of offshore funds.

Funds flow fell 38% from $26.2 million in the previous quarter to $16 million. This was the opposite of what happened with New Zealand based funds.

FundSource says in its quarterly market share survey that funds flow into New Zealand funds increased by $67 million over the previous quarter to $116.9 million.

AMP commands the biggest market share amongst OEICs with its products accounting for 46% of funds under management and $7.2 million of the funds flow in the December quarter.

Three other players, Armstrong Jones, Challenger and Royal & SunAlliance are battling it out for second place in terms of funds under management.

The interesting point is that Challenger, with just one OEIC, has about the same amount of funds under management as AJ and RSA which have 12 and nine funds respectively.

Challenger's funds under management account for 21% of the total, while AJ sits at 19% and RSA at 14%.

The Challenger GAM Trans-Tasman share fund has $25.2 million in funds under management and has posted a 11.63% return in the December quarter, but only 0.8% in the 12 month period to December 31.

While they are close in terms of net assets, it's a different story with fund flows. On this count AJ was clearly ahead of RSA and Challenger.

The positive funds flow enjoyed by AJ and RSA in the OEIC market helps to compensate for their low rankings in the New Zealand domiciled managed fund area.

According to FundSource AJ was second to last on the table with outflows of $20.74 million and RSA was two places higher on the table with outflows of $16.3 million.

The most popular sector with OEIC funds was European shares. In the three months ending December 31 investors put $4.86 million into this sector, mainly through AMP Henderson's fund.

That was followed by international shares, Australasian shares and US shares respectively.

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