Call for transparency to ensure investor confidence

Investment advisor Chris Douglas of My Fiduciary says KiwiSaver fund managers have an obligation to provide full and frank disclosure to investors and even prospective investors.

His comments come in the wake of multiple KiwiSaver schemes losing money through investment in the failed US mid-tier banks Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank.

“Too often people feel that funds are opaque. That’s changed a lot over the last few years with greater transparency from regulation and quarterly reporting, but with KiwiSaver in particular, there are incentives to join; it’s government sponsored, there’s the tax credit, and so there’s a higher level of obligation from fund managers to really make sure they engage with the public and with the media, on what they're doing and why.”

Last week Newsroom reported that the Fisher Funds KiwiSaver scheme had lost millions of dollars through Signature Bank investments. This was confirmed by Fisher to be around $50 million from its select international portfolio and NZX-listed investment company Marlin Global. A Fisher Fund spokesperson says, “To put that into perspective, for a customer with $50,000 invested in our KiwiSaver Growth fund, their total loss is only about $320.”