Woodford > LF Equity Income Fund > Class actions

Sterlingtimes

dunstonh said:

Attentive investors may or may not have explored the structural nature of the investment.

If they did and they still decided to invest, then it's their own fault.

If they didn't and invested then it's their own fault.

Thank you, Dunstonh. I would have been inclined to agree with you but having been bitten, I think that there are agencies here that have acted in a less than proper manner. The various legal firms think that there is a possibility of salvaging something from the mess. Hargreaves, in particular, charged a heavy premium for their HL MULTI-MANAGER INCOME & GROWTH TRUST fund, selected Woodfood as a preferential investment for its client and stuck with it until the fund was frozen. If H&L failed to see the structural problems of the fund, what chance has the little person got?

NottinghamKnight

Sterlingtimes said:

dunstonh said:

Attentive investors may or may not have explored the structural nature of the investment.

If they did and they still decided to invest, then it's their own fault.

If they didn't and invested then it's their own fault.

Thank you, Dunstonh. I would have been inclined to agree with you but having been bitten, I think that there are agencies here that have acted in a less than proper manner. The various legal firms think that there is a possibility of salvaging something from the mess. Hargreaves, in particular, charged a heavy premium for their HL MULTI-MANAGER INCOME & GROWTH TRUST fund, selected Woodfood as a preferential investment for its client and stuck with it until the fund was frozen. If H&L failed to see the structural problems of the fund, what chance has the little person got?

It could, of course, be suggested that HL didn't fail to see the structural problems, but were getting far too well paid for promoting it to suggest that it might be a bad investment. 

talexuser

Sterlingtimes said:

If H&L failed to see the structural problems of the fund, what chance has the little person got?

Is there any evidence they failed to see? They (after the fact) have said they privately spoke to Woodford about concerns for quite a while, while continuing to recommend it publicly and use it in their multi manager stuff up to the last minute. Other brokers recommended getting out many many months before it crashed. A clearer example of conflict of interest is difficult to imagine.

arnoldy

Yes good post TALEXUSER. It was a real cats cradle of vested and conflicting interests.
I believe HL were selling down in their Multi Manager funds whilst still pushing Woodford on the now discredited "best buy" list.
In addition no one has explained the indecent haste of Link to close the fund (without consulting the investors - with the possible exception of HL (speculation)).
If anything the real nasty smells are around Link and their Corporate behaviors and competence before during and after.
The subsequent debacle and fire sale has been an embarrassment to UK financial services, and now we find the Legal firms (good on them) are acting as surrogate FCA which is moving at the pace of a snail - if at all. 

talexuser

Article in Borisgraph about Fundsmith reaching 10 years has a quote from someone from HL explaining it is not on their wealth list, despite obvious stellar performance, because of "transparency". They say they want monthly holdings and liquidity data whereas Fundsmith only supply six monthly. Well the monthly holdings and liquidity data did not help them much with Woodford..... and no mention of the fact that Fundsmith refuses to offer them a price discount, as have many of their wealth recommendations.

jimjames

itwasntme001 said:

dunstonh said:

itwasntme001 said:

Can I get compensation even though I sold the fund at a (small) loss before it collapsed?

I am not sure if you have posted that in irony or are serious.   So, if you posted in irony, then LOL.   If you posted seriously then no you cant.

I am being serious.

If you got out in cash before the fund was suspended then count yourself lucky

Alexland

talexuser said:

Article in Borisgraph about Fundsmith reaching 10 years has a quote from someone from HL explaining it is not on their wealth list, despite obvious stellar performance, because of "transparency". They say they want monthly holdings and liquidity data whereas Fundsmith only supply six monthly. Well the monthly holdings and liquidity data did not help them much with Woodford..... and no mention of the fact that Fundsmith refuses to offer them a price discount, as have many of their wealth recommendations.

This is no saintly call for transparency and improved industry standards - HL have long wanted a regular flow of data about what holdings Terry is building up and how he is managing his portfolio so they can copy it better in their own-brand growth fund.

Alex

Moe_The_Bartender

Alexland said:

talexuser said:

Article in Borisgraph about Fundsmith reaching 10 years has a quote from someone from HL explaining it is not on their wealth list, despite obvious stellar performance, because of "transparency". They say they want monthly holdings and liquidity data whereas Fundsmith only supply six monthly. Well the monthly holdings and liquidity data did not help them much with Woodford..... and no mention of the fact that Fundsmith refuses to offer them a price discount, as have many of their wealth recommendations.

This is no saintly call for transparency and improved industry standards - HL have long wanted a regular flow of data about what holdings Terry is building up and how he is managing his portfolio so they can copy it better in their own-brand growth fund.

Alex

That was my initial impression but in reality, there's very little overlap. Personally, I wouldn’t invest in HL Global Growth as it doesn’t fit into my portfolio but, in fairness, it doesn’t seem to be a bad fund on its early record.

Funsmith's holdings are there to be found if you know where to look but HL's views about FS liquidity are simply absurd. They’re worried that he wouldn’t be able to sell Microsoft shares in a hurry? Give me a break.

bowlhead99

Moe_The_Bartender said:

Alexland said:

talexuser said:

Article in Borisgraph about Fundsmith reaching 10 years has a quote from someone from HL explaining it is not on their wealth list, despite obvious stellar performance, because of "transparency". They say they want monthly holdings and liquidity data whereas Fundsmith only supply six monthly. Well the monthly holdings and liquidity data did not help them much with Woodford..... and no mention of the fact that Fundsmith refuses to offer them a price discount, as have many of their wealth recommendations.

This is no saintly call for transparency and improved industry standards - HL have long wanted a regular flow of data about what holdings Terry is building up and how he is managing his portfolio so they can copy it better in their own-brand growth fund.

Alex

That was my initial impression but in reality, there's very little overlap. Personally, I wouldn’t invest in HL Global Growth as it doesn’t fit into my portfolio but, in fairness, it doesn’t seem to be a bad fund on its early record.

Funsmith's holdings are there to be found if you know where to look but HL's views about FS liquidity are simply absurd. They’re worried that he wouldn’t be able to sell Microsoft shares in a hurry? Give me a break.

He likes to tell the story (on stage at various AGMs going back several years) that he had no interest in giving a promotional discount to HL to make it more affordable for the customers who want to pay them high platform fees (and thereby get onto the HL marketing list), because the split of total compensation would be skewed towards the people doing the administration job rather than the people (his firm) making the investment decisions that actually make all the money. He would rather let performance speak for itself.  Perhaps if he hadn't done so well and didn't have the 'performance speaks for itself' angle to generate investor net inflows, he might have needed to be be more humble and given a discount - and then they would have promoted him based on his 'great experience counting for more than the short term results' or some such excuse for letting him pay to play.   

As he did well, there was no reason for him to be humble - and as it would have weakened their position in pushing for discounts from other fund managers, HL didn't want to promote him on their wealth lists without the extra value for their customers that a nice discount would give them. As time went on, it seemed increasingly unrealistic that HL would continue to say FS was not one that they had selected as one of the better funds in its sector, and that it was yet to be proven over the longer term, while being happy to add other managers which had no greater pedigree but were willing to play the game with extra discounts or kickbacks. These days with the 'reinvention' yet again of their marketing lists, they have said it's all about transparency and so that's the latest excuse not to promote him, regardless of other factors around performance, depth of resources, culture, ESG etc.  And who could blame them for keeping someone off the list due to perceived 'liquidity' issues, however slight, given what happened to the last guy they promoted to the bitter end

A great many investors signing up to HL will still just look to the 'wealth shortlist' or whatever it's called these days, because as a new investor, who wouldn't want someone to give you a shortlist of carefully researched options?  So managers would love to be on it, but only if it doesn't cost them too much in discount or whatever sweetener can technically qualify as 'not a kickback, honest guv'.

Prism

Moe_The_Bartender said:

Alexland said:

talexuser said:

Article in Borisgraph about Fundsmith reaching 10 years has a quote from someone from HL explaining it is not on their wealth list, despite obvious stellar performance, because of "transparency". They say they want monthly holdings and liquidity data whereas Fundsmith only supply six monthly. Well the monthly holdings and liquidity data did not help them much with Woodford..... and no mention of the fact that Fundsmith refuses to offer them a price discount, as have many of their wealth recommendations.

This is no saintly call for transparency and improved industry standards - HL have long wanted a regular flow of data about what holdings Terry is building up and how he is managing his portfolio so they can copy it better in their own-brand growth fund.

Alex

That was my initial impression but in reality, there's very little overlap. Personally, I wouldn’t invest in HL Global Growth as it doesn’t fit into my portfolio but, in fairness, it doesn’t seem to be a bad fund on its early record.

Funsmith's holdings are there to be found if you know where to look but HL's views about FS liquidity are simply absurd. They’re worried that he wouldn’t be able to sell Microsoft shares in a hurry? Give me a break.

As the full holdings with a percentage breakdown are released every three months I do wonder what sort of visibility they really want. Monthly I guess. Morningstar lists the top 25 for free nowadays. A premium accounts gets the last 4-5.