A number of key departures from Investors Mutual Limited's (IML) equities team has prompted research houses to review two of the group's funds.
The departure of senior portfolio manager Paul Frost and equities analyst Shaun O'Malley has prompted Zenith Investment Partners to remove the IML Australian Share Fund and the IML Industrial Share Fund from its recommended list. Zenith has also given both funds an approved rating, its only lower rating would be not approved.
Lonsec has placed the IML Australian Share Fund and IML Industrial Share Fund on a fund watch. The researcher had previously rated the funds as highly recommended.
Morningstar has decided to maintain its recommended research recommendation.
"The reality is IML practices a low turnover approach that Anton has always been intimately involved with. While staff change isn't typically a good thing, after discussions with Anton we are comfortable enough that the changes won't adversely affect the portfolio in the near term," Morningstar Research senior research analyst Tim Murphy said.
The departures of Frost and O'Malley follow the exit of former investment team members Andrew King (September 2006), Monik Kotecha (January 2007) and Rishi Khilnani (November 2007).
IML will replace Frost and O'Malley with former Confluence Asset Management analyst Chris Prunty and former Ord Minnett analyst Mark Wade. They will join IML on 3 March 2008 and 25 March 2008 respectively.
Investment director Anton Tagliaferro will now assume portfolio management responsibility for these funds, as well as interim coverage of the banking and insurance stocks previously covered by Frost.
Following the downgrade of IML's funds, Zenith's preferred large cap value style managers are Perpetual Investments and Perennial Value Management.
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