Milford’s PIE Funds Have A Strong First Year
It’s been a year since we launched the Milford Aggressive and Peak unit trusts and the Aon KiwiSaver Milford Aggressive Fund and what a year it has been! The market volatility has been extreme and as bad as we have experienced over our many years in financial markets. The good news from our perspective is that the Milford funds have substantially outperformed the Australian and New Zealand sharemarkets over the past 12 months. The Milford Aggressive Fund was up 7.6% (after all fees) for the past 12 months. While this is below its absolute orientated benchmark of 10.0% per annum it is a good result given the negative 27.8% return from the NZX 50 Gross Index over the same period. The Aon Kiwisaver Milford Aggressive Fund also had a positive return of 7.6% over the same period. The Milford Peak Fund, which is more of an index relative fund, was 14.8% ahead of its benchmark (-11.0% net of fees return versus the NZX50 Portfolio index of –25.8%). The Aon Kiwisaver Milford Aggressive is likely to be one of the top performing KiwiSaver funds over the twelve month period against other growth-orientated KiwiSaver products. Milford’s PIE Funds – Performance Since Inception to 30/9/08 Fund Since Inception Benchmark NZX 50 Gross Index Milford Aggressive Fund* 7.6% 10.0% -27.8% Milford Peak Fund* -11.0% -25.8% -27.8% Aon KiwiSaver Milford Aggresive Fund 7.6% 10.0% -27.8% *Returns are before tax and after all fees The Aggressive Fund has an absolute positive return target of 10% per annum. Given its opportunistic, benchmark indifferent investment style it should perform relatively better than the Peak Fund during difficult sharemarket conditions. The funds’ performance since their launch is consistent with this. The Peak Fund is benchmarked against the NZX Portfolio Index and was invested in a wider range of Australasian listed companies through the twelve month period. This fund has a much stronger correlation with conventional sharemarket indices than the Aggressive Fund. All three Milford PIE funds are doing very well relative to the market and we are confident that this can continue. However, it is important to note that they each have five year plus investment horizons and twelve months is obviously a very short time period in this context. The immediate New Zealand sharemarket outlook is mixed due to volatile offshore markets and earnings outlook concerns. This is a challenging environment and places a premium on stock picking skills. Therefore Milford will continue to look for special opportunities in order to outperform the funds’ respective benchmarks. Anthony Quirk, 2 October 2008
^Returns are after all investment management fees and before tax, administration, audit, legal and other such
fees charged by AonSaver.
The Milford KiwiSaver Plan has two KiwiSaver Funds available to New Zealand investors: The Milford Aggressive KiwiSaver Fund and The Milford Balanced KiwiSaver Fund. Click here to switch to Milford.
We have four PIE registered Funds: The Milford Balanced Fund, The Milford Aggressive Fund, The Milford Peak Fund and The Milford Income Fund.
Individually Managed Accounts (IMAs) are portfolios of investments tailored to clients risk profiles and requirements for growth, income and capital preservation.