Manager Research
all members of our manager research team have over ten years of investment experience.
Denker Capital informed us last week that the team responsible for the Denker Global Emerging Markets Fund has resigned. The team consists of the portfolio manager Neal Smith and senior equity analyst Richard Shepherd.
Given the limited capacity to manage emerging market equities in the broader team, which has a greater focus on developed markets, Denker has decided to appoint Sanlam Investments (SI) as the sub-advisor on the fund effective from the 14th of June onwards. Denker was formed in 2015 following the merger of SIM Unconstrained Capital Partners (who managed SIM Value, now Denker Equity) and SIM Global, and SI retains a minority ownership stake in the business.
Neal and Richard will continue to manage the fund until SI takes over as investment manager on the 14th of June. SI recently hired the old Old Mutual Emerging Markets (OMEM) team after Old Mutual closed the franchise. The team joined SI on the 1st of June. The fund will also be rebranded as the Sanlam Global Emerging Markets fund in due course, subject to regulatory approval.
Given the extent of the changes across the business, investment team and process, we have no visibility as to the way the fund will be managed going forward. As a result we have downgraded the fund to Tier 3 at this stage. We will be withdrawing our rating on the fund after the new team takes over, until such time we can cover the new team and process.
The changes to the ratings are summarised as below:
|
FUND |
OLD RATING |
NEW RATING |
|
Denker Global Emerging Markets Fund |
Tier 2 |
Tier 3 |
|
Denker Global Emerging Markets Feeder Fund |
Tier 2 |
Tier 3 |
Denker Global Emerging Markets Fund downgraded to Tier 3
4 Jun 2019