VINAY Agarwal, manager of the First State Indian Subcontinent fund, leads the field in the Scottish fund manager league table, and remains just outside the top 10 in the monthly Citywire rankings of more than 4,000 UK and European managers.
Mr Agarwal is in pole position for the fifth month in a row, after his fund became eligible for the Citywire rankings last December, and slips from 10 to 15 in the overall rankings.
The Herald's table ranks managers in houses with a significant Scottish presence and the latest rankings are based on the managers’ three-year performance to the end of May. The number of managers to secure the coveted AAA rating rises from nine, in the previous table for the three years to April, to 12.
With the Brexit effect poised to feed in to fund performance in the remainder of the year, the volatility of 2016 is already showing through in the May figures.
Previous top 10 high-flier Jacob de Tusch-Lec at Artemis, for instance, is currently ranked 41, while Baillie Gifford’s Japanese team Matthew Brett and Sarah Whitley, past table-toppers, dropped out of the Scottish league altogether in April and are now ranked at 69 and 75 respectively.
Mr Agarwal joined First State as a portfolio manager in 2011. His Indian sub-continent fund was down 0.3 per cent in the first five months of 2016 after registering a 15.7per cent rise in the previous three months, marginally behind its country benchmark of 15.8per cent.
Claiming second and third places in the table are Ben Russon and Colin Morton, who co-manage four UK equity and equity income funds at Franklin Templeton.
Mr Russon’s overall ranking nudges up from 61 to 58 while Mr Morton’s rises from 141 to 119.
Behind the Franklin Templeton duo is Sashi Reddy, manager at the Stewart Investor Asia Pacific Sustainability fund, whose ranking eases from 94 to 129.
Kames Capital bag the next three places in the table. Iain Wells and Douglas Scott, co-managers on the UK Equity Income fund, both rise 79 places in the big league to sit at 177 and 178, closely followed by top 10 regular Audrey Ryan, who runs the UK Opportunities, Ethical Equity, and Ethical Cautious Managed funds.
Thomas Moore, manager of Standard Life’s UK Equity Income Unconstrained fund, who headed the Scottish league for several months last year, proves his resilience with a rise from ninth to eighth place, his overall position climbing from 291 to 232.
Close behind is Mark Hall, whose responsibilities on the Franklin Templeton UK team include the equity income, midcap and smaller companies funds.
The top 10 is completed by Richard Jones, manager on the First State Asian Equity and Indian Subcontinent funds, whose overall ranking slides from 221 to 290.
The Scottish table has two other AAA rated managers this time, Richard Bullas who co-manages UK funds with Mr Hall at Franklin, and Craig Yeaman at Saracen, manager of the boutique’s Growth Alpha fund. Mr Yeaman jumps from 454 to 345 overall.
There is a strong showing from the biggest boutique, SVM Asset Management, with co-founders Margaret Lawson and Colin McLean ranked 13 and 14 and Hugh Cuthbert at 18.
Standard Life Investments loses three managers from the table but still leads the way with 15, Baillie Gifford and First State have 12, Artemis 11 , Franklin Templeton 10, Kames Capital eight, and SVM four, the same as Aberdeen Asset Management.
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