Fisher Investments UK

[river_rat]

I downloaded a pack from these guys a while back and then agreed to a meeting with an advisor following a sales call, not something I would normally do but I've been a bit concerned that my existing pension isn't preforming particularly well over the last 18 months or so.

Fishers performance over the last few years looks pretty decent with returns of 25% 2016, 13% 2017 and 8 or 9% so far this year, which is a lot better than my own has managed (mine is managed by an IFA and then placed within his recommended scheme/wrapper).

I'm aware their fees are higher than some and there is a 2.25% transfer fee, so not the cheapest.

Anyone else using them - good or bad experiences?

[Zoon]

I wouldn't be paying someone 2.25% to invest my money with them initially.

Sounds a bit like money for nothing.

[springfan62]

I did the same downloaded a report and they hassled me for a while.

To my mind anyone that is selling as hard as that is on a very big commission and so I refused any meeting or further contact.

Compare their returns to the Vanguard Life Strategy for example and see what they achieve for less than 0.2 %

[JulianPH]

They don't seem to have good reviews...

https://moneyforums.citywire.co.uk/yaf_postsm45115...

[river_rat]

springfan62 said:

I did the same downloaded a report and they hassled me for a while.

To my mind anyone that is selling as hard as that is on a very big commission and so I refused any meeting or further contact.

Compare their returns to the Vanguard Life Strategy for example and see what they achieve for less than 0.2 %

Assuming I'm looking at the correct Vanguard graph, the Fisher portfolio has outperformed it by between 2 and 5% every year for the last 5:

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

[Bigcarrot91]

river_rat said:

Assuming I'm looking at the correct Vanguard graph, the Fisher portfolio has outperformed it by between 2 and 5% every year for the last 5:

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

Have they outperformed by taking much more risk?

Is the quoted performance net or gross of fees?

[Zoon]

river_rat said:

springfan62 said:

I did the same downloaded a report and they hassled me for a while.

To my mind anyone that is selling as hard as that is on a very big commission and so I refused any meeting or further contact.

Compare their returns to the Vanguard Life Strategy for example and see what they achieve for less than 0.2 %

Assuming I'm looking at the correct Vanguard graph, the Fisher portfolio has outperformed it by between 2 and 5% every year for the last 5:

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

Fundsmith has outperformed both of them for the last 5.

[river_rat]

Bigcarrot91 said:

Have they outperformed by taking much more risk?

Is the quoted performance net or gross of fees?

Net of fees - investing in global stock markets, so not high risk IMO (but obviously higher risk than having a higher mix of stocks and bonds etc). At my age (46) a 'risk' I would be happy with.

[river_rat]

Zoon said:

Fundsmith has outperformed both of them for the last 5.

Thanks Zoon - this is the type of alternative that helps my decision. Presumably I need to move my pension into this type of fund via an IFA (or can I do it myself)? Apologies for the basic questions......

[river_rat]

JulianPH said:

They don't seem to have good reviews...

https://moneyforums.citywire.co.uk/yaf_postsm45115...

Julian, I have read a lot of your posts on here in the past and you seem well informed - any recommendations as an alternative to Fisher?

[JulianPH]

river_rat said:

Thanks Zoon - this is the type of alternative that helps my decision. Presumably I need to move my pension into this type of fund via an IFA (or can I do it myself)? Apologies for the basic questions......

Assuming it is a personal pension your can do it yourself without paying for an IFA.

If it is a SIPP you won't have to move it, just change the funds within.

If it is a final salary company pension worth more than £30k you have to take financial advice.

[JulianPH]

river_rat said:

JulianPH said:

They don't seem to have good reviews...

https://moneyforums.citywire.co.uk/yaf_postsm45115...

Julian, I have read a lot of your posts on here in the past and you seem well informed - any recommendations as an alternative to Fisher?

Hi James, cheers!

The are (obviously) many options available depending what you are looking for. If you are looking for a direct comparison to Fisher (that is to say a managed global portfolio) then most discretionary managers offer this through model portfolios. Hargreaves Lansdown also offer this, but it is very expensive (more than Fisher charge).

If you are happy to have a passive global portfolio then Vanguard are a very good option.

BTY - The use of the words 'managed' and 'passive' above relates only to the asset allocation model. Both approaches can use either 'managed' or 'passive' underlying funds (though most do use passive underlying funds).

The difference between the two approaches (and I have to do some generalising here to keep things simple) is that a passive global portfolio (Vanguard, for example) will weight your holdings exactly as they correspond to the global market itself.

So if (for example - and using a round numbers) the UK represented 10% of the global market that is how your portfolio would be weighted to the UK. This is identical with every other global sector.

In this respect everything is run by a computer.

A managed global portfolio is very different in that it has a fund/investment manager who is able to use their discretion as how to weight your portfolio according to their house view. This is what give the potential for out performance (that Fisher have delivered).

It is for this reason that passive/passive funds (such as Vanguard) deal with risk/reward by reducing the level of equity exposure and increasing the level of bond exposure accordingly.

This is quite a crude and blunt way of doing this though, as in some market cycles bonds can actually outperform equities.

Managed/passive funds (such as Fisher) achieve different levels of risk/reward by completely changing the portfolio weightings to fit the risk/reward profile you have selected whilst taking into account current market cycles.

My personal preference is for managed (asset allocation) and passive (underlying investments) rather than everything being completely passive. This is because repeated research shows that asset allocation if the primary driver of returns (and the pricing is about the same as the purely passive approach).

Fundsmith (on the other hand) is managed/managed. Terry is not particularly concerned with asset allocation, he focuses on stock picking (and is 64% invested in US stocks).

You can't fault his returns but I personally would not want my pension to have 36% of its assets in tech stocks (including the likes of Facebook) and feel he has massively moved away from his original 'consumer staples' model (now only 25% of the total fund value).

I realise I am turning what was meant to be a quick response into an essay so will leave it here for now. Let me know which route you prefer and I'll give you some providers to look at. Feel free to PM me if that is more practical.

[river_rat]

Thanks Julian - PM sent

[Derek Chevalier]

river_rat said:

I downloaded a pack from these guys a while back and then agreed to a meeting with an advisor following a sales call, not something I would normally do but I've been a bit concerned that my existing pension isn't preforming particularly well over the last 18 months or so.

Fishers performance over the last few years looks pretty decent with returns of 25% 2016, 13% 2017 and 8 or 9% so far this year, which is a lot better than my own has managed (mine is managed by an IFA and then placed within his recommended scheme/wrapper).

I'm aware their fees are higher than some and there is a 2.25% transfer fee, so not the cheapest.

Anyone else using them - good or bad experiences?

I do drone on about this, but if you are comparing the returns of the portfolio your IFA has constructed for you vs something else, that would imply that your IFA primarily focuses on managing money, which IMO is a commoditised area and therefore something I would pay buttons for.

Maybe worth finding a decent financial planner locally to you that cares primarily about you, understands your goals, objectives, lifestyle aspirations both now and in the future, builds you a plan and only then looks at the investment side.

[Derek Chevalier]

river_rat said:

springfan62 said:

I did the same downloaded a report and they hassled me for a while.

To my mind anyone that is selling as hard as that is on a very big commission and so I refused any meeting or further contact.

Compare their returns to the Vanguard Life Strategy for example and see what they achieve for less than 0.2 %

Assuming I'm looking at the correct Vanguard graph, the Fisher portfolio has outperformed it by between 2 and 5% every year for the last 5:

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

(In direct contradiction to what I just said about the investment side not being important. It's my background and genuinely interests me - in large part because I love to analyse the industry's claims/BS.....)


There isn't much that has beaten LS over the last 5 years, and those that have usually have got lucky (by taking a tilt towards large cap growth, or small cap for example which has started to unwind in recent weeks).

If you have an ISIN you could post I will take a look.

[Derek Chevalier]

Zoon said:

river_rat said:

springfan62 said:

I did the same downloaded a report and they hassled me for a while.

To my mind anyone that is selling as hard as that is on a very big commission and so I refused any meeting or further contact.

Compare their returns to the Vanguard Life Strategy for example and see what they achieve for less than 0.2 %

Assuming I'm looking at the correct Vanguard graph, the Fisher portfolio has outperformed it by between 2 and 5% every year for the last 5:

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

http://www.morningstar.co.uk/uk/funds/snapshot/sna...

Fundsmith has outperformed both of them for the last 5.

Great, but do you understand why?

[Derek Chevalier]

river_rat said:

Zoon said:

Fundsmith has outperformed both of them for the last 5.

Thanks Zoon - this is the type of alternative that helps my decision. Presumably I need to move my pension into this type of fund via an IFA (or can I do it myself)? Apologies for the basic questions......

Giving the choice of

a). Having my money managed by a product salesman
b). Working with a financial planning professional
c). Taking tips from the internet

I think c). ranks even lower than a).

It may be worth buying some books and educating yourself before making any decisions

[Derek Chevalier]

JulianPH said:

This is because repeated research shows that asset allocation if the primary driver of returns (and the pricing is about the same as the purely passive approach).

Evening Julian, agreed with this, but I've not seen research to suggest anyone can consistently pick future outperforming assets, similar to being unable to consistently pick outperforming funds/shares.

JulianPH said:

This is quite a crude and blunt way of doing this though, as in some market cycles bonds can actually outperform equities

I've not seen a more convincing alternative

JulianPH said:

You can't fault his returns

I think the most important thing is to understand how his returns are generated (in particular the specific tailwinds over the last decade). If you pick similar benchmarks to his style I don't see massive outperformance.

[Derek Chevalier]

river_rat said:

Bigcarrot91 said:

Have they outperformed by taking much more risk?

Is the quoted performance net or gross of fees?

Net of fees - investing in global stock markets, so not high risk IMO (but obviously higher risk than having a higher mix of stocks and bonds etc). At my age (46) a 'risk' I would be happy with.

But is it a risk you need to take in order to achieve your objectives?

[TooLateForAName]

Derek Chevalier said:

There isn't much that has beaten LS over the last 5 years, and those that have usually have got lucky (by taking a tilt towards large cap growth, or small cap for example which has started to unwind in recent weeks).

Can I display my ignorance and ask what/who LS is?