Woodford anyone?
Discussion
Looks like some of Woodford's holdings were sold at a significant discount: https://citywire.co.uk/new-model-adviser/news/us-b...
nyt said:
Looks like some of Woodford's holdings were sold at a significant discount: https://citywire.co.uk/new-model-adviser/news/us-b...
That sounds well dodgy. 
Anyone signed up for Woodford litigation?
My father died a few years back leaving my mum with a load of money in Woodford in HL S&S ISA. I didn't know my equities from my elbow at the time so left these apparently successful investments alone until such a time as I understood them. "The most successful DIY investors are the dead ones" as the research said.
Obviously this was not true of money in Woodford, and she is being drip fed back small amounts as everyone else is.
Anyway now I understand there was failings on behalf of HL and Link that are being explored in the courts.
Which of the firms have people signed up with and why?
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/investing/arti...
My father died a few years back leaving my mum with a load of money in Woodford in HL S&S ISA. I didn't know my equities from my elbow at the time so left these apparently successful investments alone until such a time as I understood them. "The most successful DIY investors are the dead ones" as the research said.
Obviously this was not true of money in Woodford, and she is being drip fed back small amounts as everyone else is.
Anyway now I understand there was failings on behalf of HL and Link that are being explored in the courts.
Which of the firms have people signed up with and why?
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/investing/arti...
alscar said:
Yes on no win no fee basis through Leigh Day.
They are going for Link rather than HL although I still think the latter in the way they promoted Woodford from Day 1 etc are more than culpable still.
Well, equally Link have the bigger responsibility which cannot be ignored.... all a bit more ethereal as to whether in marketing it’s just a bit of hype and an offer to treat compared to those contractually responsible for running the show.....They are going for Link rather than HL although I still think the latter in the way they promoted Woodford from Day 1 etc are more than culpable still.
Bobtherallyfan said:
For what? HL website is covered in warnings that investments can go up or down. I don’t remember anyone moaning when the the funds were going up.
That issue has been covered before. It’s a question of too cosy a relationship between HL and Woodford and also the massive drift in strategy which wasn’t adequately communicated to investors.trickywoo said:
Bobtherallyfan said:
For what? HL website is covered in warnings that investments can go up or down. I don’t remember anyone moaning when the the funds were going up.
That issue has been covered before. It’s a question of too cosy a relationship between HL and Woodford and also the massive drift in strategy which wasn’t adequately communicated to investors.https://pensioncraft.com/neil-woodford-lost-mojo/
All too easy to place blame solely on HL and Woodford strategy drift, but Bob raise a valid point. I wonder how many Woodford investors proactively kept track of the fund news and performance, or even read the fund manager interim/annual report (which list the buying and selling activities)? The fund collapse didn't happen overnight as detailed in the above link, and imo there was plenty of red flags which would concern any investors e. g. Loss of confidence from your peer / Jupiter pulling business away!!! Despite the poor investment performance pre-collapse, I suspect many high risk investors continued backing Woodford in anticipation of a turnaround. Or as Bob suggested above, other so-called investors who sat back and did nothing / no further monitoring or due diligence, but enjoyed the good times, and only woke up when the SHTF....
Edited by chip* on Saturday 5th December 12:28
I had a fair chunk of money in WF (within my portfolio of other funds) via my IFA and via the investment company my IFA worked for. At the time of Woodford's shenanigans coming out into the media I just thought "oh well, investments can go down as well as up, and it's the risk we take and I'll take it on the chin etc etc.." but the more I think about it the more it angers me that my IFA (or should I say the company he worked for) should of been on the ball with what they were selling to their clients. I was in Woodford up until the day it was suspended so there was plenty of time for the company I trusted with my money to have sold out.
Phooey said:
I had a fair chunk of money in WF (within my portfolio of other funds) via my IFA and via the investment company my IFA worked for. At the time of Woodford's shenanigans coming out into the media I just thought "oh well, investments can go down as well as up, and it's the risk we take and I'll take it on the chin etc etc.." but the more I think about it the more it angers me that my IFA (or should I say the company he worked for) should of been on the ball with what they were selling to their clients. I was in Woodford up until the day it was suspended so there was plenty of time for the company I trusted with my money to have sold out.
^^I say this just as an observer to the Woodford saga and I don't know if there's precedence for this but I do wonder how you'd do if you asked your IFA why the hell they thought cold fusion (and the other things) were considered an appropriate change of approach from the "UK blue chip" companies that Woodford had previously invested in.
You're the sort of investor I have much more sympathy for than I do the investors who actually choose to do their own homework but were perhaps a little too slow to react.
b
hstewie said:
hstewie said: ^^
I say this just as an observer to the Woodford saga and I don't know if there's precedence for this but I do wonder how you'd do if you asked your IFA why the hell they thought cold fusion (and the other things) were considered an appropriate change of approach from the "UK blue chip" companies that Woodford had previously invested in.
You're the sort of investor I have much more sympathy for than I do the investors who actually choose to do their own homework but were perhaps a little too slow to react.
Thanks mate, fwiw when I heard about the WF problems in the media I questioned my IFA and all I got was a response along the lines of "he had done so well in the past... we knew his performance was lacking recently... but that we thought he would come back.. bla bla bla".I say this just as an observer to the Woodford saga and I don't know if there's precedence for this but I do wonder how you'd do if you asked your IFA why the hell they thought cold fusion (and the other things) were considered an appropriate change of approach from the "UK blue chip" companies that Woodford had previously invested in.
You're the sort of investor I have much more sympathy for than I do the investors who actually choose to do their own homework but were perhaps a little too slow to react.
I moved everything off my IFA after this. I estimate they (the company my IFA worked for) were having approx £5k/yr fees from my pot including platform charges etc. I wasn't trusting them with any more of my money.
chip* said:
Worth investing 20mins to read up + embedded videos on this excellent write up on Neil Woodford, investment style, and timeline of the major events leading to the eventual collapse of the main fund.
https://pensioncraft.com/neil-woodford-lost-mojo/
All too easy to place blame solely on HL and Woodford strategy drift, but Bob raise a valid point. I wonder how many Woodford investors proactively kept track of the fund news and performance, or even read the fund manager interim/annual report (which list the buying and selling activities)? The fund collapse didn't happen overnight as detailed in the above link, and imo there was plenty of red flags which would concern any investors e. g. Loss of confidence from your peer / Jupiter pulling business away!!! Despite the poor investment performance pre-collapse, I suspect many high risk investors continued backing Woodford in anticipation of a turnaround. Or as Bob suggested above, other so-called investors who sat back and did nothing / no further monitoring or due diligence, but enjoyed the good times, and only woke up when the SHTF....
Great post.https://pensioncraft.com/neil-woodford-lost-mojo/
All too easy to place blame solely on HL and Woodford strategy drift, but Bob raise a valid point. I wonder how many Woodford investors proactively kept track of the fund news and performance, or even read the fund manager interim/annual report (which list the buying and selling activities)? The fund collapse didn't happen overnight as detailed in the above link, and imo there was plenty of red flags which would concern any investors e. g. Loss of confidence from your peer / Jupiter pulling business away!!! Despite the poor investment performance pre-collapse, I suspect many high risk investors continued backing Woodford in anticipation of a turnaround. Or as Bob suggested above, other so-called investors who sat back and did nothing / no further monitoring or due diligence, but enjoyed the good times, and only woke up when the SHTF....
Edited by chip* on Saturday 5th December 12:28
Woodford has delivered some incredible results since 1988 and was largely championed by the whole industry for 20+ years. He's underperformed over many periods in the past, but ultimately been proved right in the long term, so it's not unreasonable to believe he could have turned things around this time.
In terms of finger pointing, I do agree HL kept him on their buy list for two long, but if you read one of their last updates before the fund was suspended it's actually pretty balanced. It certainly doesn't say sell everything else and buy Woodford as the press reports would have you believe.
https://www.hl.co.uk/feeds/apps/article?id=1422599...
After reading this I did keep my holding in the fund, and while I wish I hadn't, it was part of balanced portfolio and so I could accept the hit.
Far more culpable in my view are the FCA and Link. The FCA should have held him to account for breaching his limits on holding unquoted stocks, and Link should have provided far better governance, and had clearly made a lot of questionable decisions since the fund suspended which has resulted in a significant reduction in value returned to unit holders.
This whole saga also demonstrates the challenges of letting investors make their own decisions without any advice. Few really understand how to create a balanced portfolio and end up taking far more risk then they realise by not diversifying sufficiently. But that's a discussion for another day.
CaptainSensib1e said:
This whole saga also demonstrates the challenges of letting investors make their own decisions without any advice. Few really understand how to create a balanced portfolio and end up taking far more risk then they realise by not diversifying sufficiently. But that's a discussion for another day.
I see your point but it also proves that taking advice (like I did) doesn't offer any guarantee of avoiding these types of funds. The only saving grace for me was it was just 5-6% of my pot invested in WF - diversification?. But it was still 5% too much. And shameful if you were charging your clients a commission for investing and managing in these types of 'risky' investments. CaptainSensib1e said:
Far more culpable in my view are the FCA and Link. The FCA should have held him to account for breaching his limits on holding unquoted stocks, and Link should have provided far better governance, and had clearly made a lot of questionable decisions since the fund suspended which has resulted in a significant reduction in value returned to unit holders.
I'd written it off as a bad investment until I read things like this and looked into it.Its surely verging on fraud to breach limits on unquoted stocks and have HL recommended the fund when they knew it was going south. Link governance had a big role! Or lack of. And the fees for selling the fund off - obscene and unreasonable.
Theres three lawsuits gunning for them, no win no fee so they must have something to get their teeth into.
Probably can only expect some tiny compo from the unfair selling off fees or something. But better than nowt.
Phooey said:
CaptainSensib1e said:
This whole saga also demonstrates the challenges of letting investors make their own decisions without any advice. Few really understand how to create a balanced portfolio and end up taking far more risk then they realise by not diversifying sufficiently. But that's a discussion for another day.
I see your point but it also proves that taking advice (like I did) doesn't offer any guarantee of avoiding these types of funds. The only saving grace for me was it was just 5-6% of my pot invested in WF - diversification?. But it was still 5% too much. And shameful if you were charging your clients a commission for investing and managing in these types of 'risky' investments. The first disconnect for me was the tech crash of 2000. I had an IFA. I thought 'But you're supposed to be looking after my money...' I know now that he was only looking after his percentage and only interested in getting to get more business on his books to get more percentages. If you're selling toothpaste in MLM, fine, but you're not...
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