Aegon default fund selection ?

JohnWinder

Sorry, confusing syntax. I'm yet to be convinced that a change of fund is needed.

Pat38493

Fund looks like its less than 70% in equities?

Personally I would have it 80% or more in equities if I had more than 10 years to go (in fact mine is around  80% now and I'm thinking of retiring in next 3 years, but that is because my retirement date is flexible and I have DB assets that I could call on as well).

Also personally I would have a much larger % in US equities.

It looks like what is there in equities is mainly in Index trackers which is good in my opinion.

JohnWinder

‘Personally I would have it 80% or more in equities if I had more than 10 years to go’

Fair enough.
Someone else used to think differently. Benjamin ‘Graham's philosophy was first and foremost to preserve capital, and then to try to make it grow. He suggested having 25% to 75% of your investments in bonds and varying this based on market conditions.’ https://www.investopedia.com/articles/basics/07/grahamprinciples.asp. Graham was Buffet’s guru.

The other aspect to consider: when folk talk of 80/20 for equities/bonds, are they talking about low risk government bonds or high risk corporate bonds? Hopefully government bonds, because high yield bonds can be nearly as risky and rewarding as equities. So, how much of Aegon fund’s ‘too much in bonds’ is actually corporate bonds that behave somewhat like equities, before we say the Aegon balance is sub-optimal?   Here you can find some measure of this: https://www.bogleheads.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=383298

flopsy1973

Hi have not done anything with this yet anybody else has any experience on the Aegon platform and their fund selections 

dunstonh

flopsy1973 said:

Hi have not done anything with this yet anybody else has any experience on the Aegon platform and their fund selections 

Which Aegon platform?

Aegon Cofunds
Aegon Scottish Equitable
Aegon Retireready
Aegon retirement choices

Fund selections vary across the different platforms.

flopsy1973

https://www.trustnet.com/factsheets/p/otbu/aegon-workplace-default-arc-pn
The above is what it is  on their retiready platform any views ? 

flopsy1973

Any comment

Pat38493

flopsy1973 said:

Any comment

Looks similar to my company default fund in Aegon which is Aegon MI Savings (H) ARC.  Looks to be about two thirds equities.

5 years performance looks ok to me but I am not really yet an expert on analyzing fund performance.

The one puzzling thing is that in the fund description, it implies that this is a lifestyle fund and will move you into less risky investments from 6 years before retirement, but the fund name doesn't have a target retirement date so this seems to imply they are going to move you into a target retirement fund automatically, when you reach 6 years before retirement.  You would have to ask Aegon to confirm, and then consider whether you want this to happen.  

Personally I don't want to be in a lifestyle fund as I want to control the timing myself of any fund mix changes.

JohnWinder

Aegon charges you 0.05%/year management fee. Their fund has 10% in a fund called 'UK Gilts All-Stocks Tracker' which looks like a Blackrock bond fund which charges about 0.2%/year. Does Aegon absorb that Blackrock fee so you don't pay it on top of your 0.05%? Do you pay it on top of your 0.05%/year? Does Aegon get a discount from Blackrock and so don't pay as much as 0.2%/year? Who knows.

dunstonh

JohnWinder said:

Aegon charges you 0.05%/year management fee. Their fund has 10% in a fund called 'UK Gilts All-Stocks Tracker' which looks like a Blackrock bond fund which charges about 0.2%/year. Does Aegon absorb that Blackrock fee so you don't pay it on top of your 0.05%? Do you pay it on top of your 0.05%/year? Does Aegon get a discount from Blackrock and so don't pay as much as 0.2%/year? Who knows.

The Aegon funds you are referring to are fettered fund of funds and work the same way as those.  (i.e. no double charging).  Whilst branded Aegon (as they are insured funds) they are effectively BlackRock funds and software-based weightings.