HL USA fund launch - thoughts/advice?

jimjames

christophercharles said:

Albermarle said:

It is not a sale, just marketing hype.

If you invest £1000, you get 1000 units in the fund as its starting price per unit is £1.

If for example the starting price was £100 , you would get 10 units.

In both cases you would have £1000 in the fund, so no difference.

Thank you for correcting me. So i guess im asking if the price per unit is good value?.

HL are doing a very good job of misleading people. You aren't the first person to think that £1 units mean it's a good deal/

dunstonh

Couldn’t they surprise us though by actually turning out to be good ??? With the fees being to one side 😬

I have invested in them but going off my own intuition and research. I am some what positive . ( we see how goes)

Next thing you should buy should be HL shares.   If this is how easy it is to sell their cash cows to their customers, their share price should do well.

Also. Why would there be any information on what the money going into. Isn’t this technically the part we’re they need to see what investments they have to finalise were and how much of the funds go into x y z company 🤔 

How do you carry out your due diligence and research on a fund if you don't know what it invests in?

NoviceInvestor1

LightKnow said:

Couldn’t they surprise us though by actually turning out to be good ??? With the fees being to one side 😬

I have invested in them but going off my own intuition and research. I am some what positive . ( we see how goes)


I probably don’t have as much experience but I don’t think it wise to dismiss a fund right of the bat and sometimes it worth taking a leap. 

Also. Why would there be any information on what the money going into. Isn’t this technically the part we’re they need to see what investments they have to finalise were and how much of the funds go into x y z company 🤔 

Fees are the only useful predictor of investment returns. Funds with high fees are far more likely to underperform, this fund has high fees.

Their website clearly shows what investments they are making via this fund.....

LightKnow

Firstly Done my research and I have an idea on what the company's are going to be but this my view and speculation ( if am going in its based on my own accord. Am not saying others should) 

2nd . Am fully aware you need to take fees into account but am not gonna totally dismiss this fund. I have my reasons for taking this step. 

3rd I agree alot with what everyone has said as contradictory this may sound, 

The point I was trying to make in my last post. It's worth asking others for advice definitely ( I know it help me alot since joining this forum) but at the same time there nothing wrong with taking a risk.if it pays of or not is down to the individual choice 


What is everyone excepting from this fund like ? Price Falliing right away? The charges eating away at your investment? Companys not being that great ? The fund manager not working the fund in most beneficial way ? 

NoviceInvestor1

LightKnow said:

Firstly Done my research and I have an idea on what the company's are going to be but this my view and speculation ( if am going in its based on my own accord. Am not saying others should) 



What is everyone excepting from this fund like ? Price Falliing right away? The charges eating away at your investment? Companys not being that great ? The fund manager not working the fund in most beneficial way ? 

Just to confirm, you are aware this fund is not investing in companies, but is investing in other funds?

In terms of expectations, I'd expect it to destroy investor capital by underperforming an US Index Tracker due to it being a collection of active funds some of which will (and have) underperformed in the past, some of which might outperform in the future. 

It needs to outperform the US Index by well over 1% a year to break even vs an index, I see that as incredibly unlikely if you look at the performance of the underlying funds.

For comparison the returns of HL's global fund of funds vehicle which has the same manager;

5 year annualised return = 1.78%

Global tracker 5 year annualised return = 7.89%

You are investing with a manager who through another vehicle with the same structure is underperforming the index by 6.11% per/annum.

jimjames

Alternatively you could read an HL article about investing in the USA which contradicts their own fund launch. Their words not mine.

https://www.hl.co.uk/funds/fund-discounts,-prices--and--factsheets/search-results/l/legal-and-general-us-index-class-c-accumulation/research

Legal & General US Index is our favourite American tracker fund. The US is the world's largest stock market so it makes sense for a diversified share portfolio to have some exposure. It's an area where few active fund managers consistently perform better than the broader US stock market, so we think a tracker fund is a great way of investing in larger US companies and keeping costs down.

But it's one of the most heavily researched in the world so share prices of well-known companies can react quickly to new information. We think this can make it more difficult for fund managers to find opportunities missed by others and to consistently perform better than the broader market over the long term. 

Exodi

LightKnow said:

Firstly Done my research and I have an idea on what the company's are going to be but this my view and speculation ( if am going in its based on my own accord. Am not saying others should) 

2nd . Am fully aware you need to take fees into account but am not gonna totally dismiss this fund. I have my reasons for taking this step. 

3rd I agree alot with what everyone has said as contradictory this may sound, 

This is unfortunate.

A fund focusing on the large and mid cap segments of the US, which commands an eye-watering 0.83% OCR on top of their platform fee = 1.28% annual cost.

A similar fund (and a top pick of mine) Legal & General US Index, commands 0.05% which if held on HL = 0.50% annual cost.

Looking at the wider picture, you can invest in US index funds on Vanguard for even cheaper:

US Equity Index Fund = 0.10% + platform fee = 0.25%
S&P 500 UCITS ETF = 0.07% + platform fee = 0.22%

Why would anyone voluntarily pay an additional ~1% in annual costs? It will absolutely dampen the future returns of your investment.

I think this is more an example of the power of branding than actual logic.