THE CONFORMISTS – WHO REFUSE

AVIVA

‘Full disclosure is unusual in the industry for reasons of competitive advantage. But we are always reviewing how we report to investors.’

BNY MELLON

‘We believe trust is built through managers achieving the targeted outcomes for their investors over the long term.’

COLUMBIA THREADNEEDLE

‘As an active manager, portfolio management decisions including decisions to buy, sell and hold certain shares, represent intellectual property and are part of the skill our customers pay us a fee for. It would be unfair to our customers to fully share this information publicly.’

CRUX

‘Whilst we support transparency, a near-live reporting of entire fund holdings may not be as desirable as it would seem. It is important to protect current investors.’

FIDELITY

‘Trust is earned by being able to demonstrate the unique value we can bring to the investor. That is why we believe it is important to balance the need for transparency with the requirement to protect the intellectual property that underpins our ability to generate returns for our clients.’

FUNDSMITH

‘We do not believe that greater disclosure than that required by the Financial Conduct Authority (the regulator) would be beneficial to our investors.’

KAMES CAPITAL

‘We do not believe full disclosure would create greater trust in the industry. What is more important is evidence of asset managers delivering returns by actively investing in a more responsible manner.’

LEGAL & GENERAL

‘Real-time disclosure does not necessarily garner trust. Investment managers do need to demonstrate clearly to clients they are acting in their best interests, but this can be achieved in other ways – transparency of charges and corporate engagement with portfolio companies to improve governance.’

RATHBONE

‘The reason for not publishing full details more often is that we have not had the demand to do so.’

ROYAL LONDON

‘We want investors to trust us with their assets not because they have seen a snapshot of a portfolio that could contain several hundred securities, but because they understand how we invest their money.’ The other asset managers we surveyed are: Artemis, Axa Investment Management, Invesco, Investec, JP Morgan, Jupiter, Lindsell Train, Liontrust, Miton and Octopus.