Ashby looking at quarterly dividends
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Graham Ashby, the head of UK equities at LVAM, is gauging market appetite for a new equity income fund paying dividends quarterly, along the lines of the American income model.
“There is demand for monthly or quarterly income, and there are not many products out there,” Ashby says. “Quarterly dividends have come over from the US and are becoming more popular.”
Ashby says he is still considering whether to launch a new product or convert a fund. Some advisers have shown interest in the possibility of a new product, he adds.
Ashby is also talking to the market about a new income portfolio with a global remit.
“Global income we are also investigating,” he says. “There is a long-term story there–global companies are increasingly recognising the importance of dividend.”
Ashby runs LVAM’s £82m UK Equity Income fund, which he took over when he joined from Credit Suisse Asset Management last August. (article continues below)
He has completed the repositioning of the fund, maintaining holdings at between 40 and 60 and introducing a “size agnostic” approach, taking significant positions across the market-cap scale.
He is critical of “identikit” income funds all investing in the same stocks. “There are crowded trades going on–a lot of income managers own the same stocks. They are well-followed, pretty dull businesses at the end of the day.”
Ashby has sold out of income fund stalwarts GlaxoSmithKline, HSBC, and Vodafone, holding AstraZeneca, Standard Chartered, and Telefonica instead.
