Each month we track changes to the management teams of actively managed, equity-oriented funds and ETFs. That excludes index funds and most fixed income funds. The index fund exclusion is pretty straightforward: in a passive fund, the managers are interchangeable cogs whose presence or absence is almost always inconsequential to the fund’s performance.
Similarly, most bond fund managers have a very limited ability to add value. Over the past ten years, for instance, the top-performing Core Bond fund in the Lipper universe outperformed its peers by just 1% per year with a virtually identical Sharpe ratio (0.98 for the top returning fund, 0.97 for the average fund). The best global income and flexible income managers outperformed by 3.5 and 2.4%, respectively, which is comparable to the margin between the best large-core equity fund managers and the pack.
This month, we noted just 31 funds with changes in their management teams.
| Ticker | Fund | Out with the old | In with the new | Dt |
| SMCVX | ALPS | Smith Credit Opportunities Fund | Steve Zamsky is no longer serving as a portfolio manager for the fund. | Jonathan Aal, Garrett Olson, and Eric Bernum join Gibson Smith in managing the fund. | 9/21 |
| CAIBX | American Funds Capital Income Builder | David M. Riley will no longer manage money in the fund. | Twelve other managers remain, raising the question, “will they even notice someone’s missing?” | 9/21 |
| CWGIX | American Funds Capital World Growth and Income Fund | David M. Riley will no longer manage money in the fund. | The rest of the team remains. | 9/21 |
| GBLAX | American Funds Global Balanced Fund | David M. Riley will no longer manage money in the fund. | Alfonso Barroso, Winnie Kwan, Thomas Høgh, Andrew Cormack, and Bradford Freer remain. | 9/21 |
| ATPCX | Aquila High Income | Effective October 1, 2021, Three Peaks Capital Management, LLC will no longer serve as Sub-Adviser. | Effective October 1, 2021, Pedro Marcal and David Schiffman will serve as portfolio managers of the fund. | 9/21 |
| ATGAX | Aquila Opportunity Growth | Effective October 1, 2021, Three Peaks Capital Management, LLC will no longer serve as Sub-Adviser. | Effective October 1, 2021, Pedro Marcal will serve as portfolio manager of the fund with John McPeake. | 9/21 |
| MPISX | BNY Mellon Income Stock | No one but… | Keith Howell joins John Bailer, Brian Ferguson, and David Intoppa as a portfolio manager of the fund. | 9/21 |
| QCVAX | Clearwater International | Effective December 31, 2021, Kurt Winrich will no longer serve as a portfolio manager of the fund. | 9/21 | |
| CSFAX | Cohen & Steers Global Realty Shares | No one but… | Effective November 1, 2021, Ji Zhang will join Jon Cheigh, William Leung and Rogier Quirijns as a portfolio manager of the fund. | 9/21 |
| IRFAX | Cohen & Steers International Realty | No one but… | Effective November 1, 2021, Ji Zhang will join Jon Cheigh, William Leung and Rogier Quirijns as a portfolio manager of the fund. | 9/21 |
| FAMEX | FAM Dividend Focus | Effective December 31, 2021, Thomas Putnam will retire as co-manager of the fund. | Effective December 31, Paul Hogan and William Preston will continue to manage for the fund. | 9/21 |
| FAMDX | FAM Small Cap | Effective December 31, 2021, Thomas Putnam will retire as co-manager of the fund. | Effective December 31, Andrew Boord and Kevin Gioia will continue to manage for the fund. | 9/21 |
| FAMVX | FAM Value | Effective December 31, 2021, Thomas Putnam will retire as co-manager of the fund. | Effective October 1, 2021, Marc Roberts will join Thomas Putnam, John D. Fox, Andrew P. Wilson and Marc Roberts in managing for the fund. | 9/21 |
| KAUFX | Federated Hermes Kaufmann Fund | Jonathan Art will no longer serve as a portfolio manager for the fund. | The rest of the team remains. | 9/21 |
| KLCAX | Federated Hermes Kaufmann Large Cap Fund | Jonathan Art will no longer serve as a portfolio manager for the fund. | The rest of the team remains. | 9/21 |
| FKASX | Federated Hermes Kaufmann Small Cap Fund | Jonathan Art will no longer serve as a portfolio manager for the fund. | The rest of the team remains. | 9/21 |
| GPGOX | Grandeur Peak Global Opportunities Fund | Robert Gardiner, GP’s founder, is moving from portfolio manager to a “Guardian Portfolio Manager” role. That’s not quite the same as chaperoning a date rather than going on one yourself, but it’s getting close. | Ben Gardiner, Amy Hu Sunderland, and Blake Walker remain. | 9/21 |
| GPIOX | Grandeur Peak International Opportunities Fund | Robert Gardiner is stepping down as co-Guardian Portfolio Manager. | Blake Walker, Juliette Douglas, and Mark Madsen remain with the fund. | 9/21 |
| JSCAX | John Hancock Small Cap Value | Effective December 31, 2022, Timothy McCormack will no longer serve as a portfolio manager of the fund. | Edmond Griffin and Shaun Pedersen will continue as portfolio managers of the fund. | 9/21 |
| OLGAX | JPMorgan Large Cap Growth | Holly Fleiss is on leave and will return about January 2, 2022. | Giri Devulapally, Larry Lee, and Joseph Wilson will continue to manage for the fund. | 9/21 |
| MKIEX | McKee International Equity Portfolio | Micheal J. Donnelly is no longer listed as a portfolio manager of the fund. | Shawna Aufman will join Micheal P. Donnelly, Bradley Thompson, Paul Frank, and Clayton Wilkin as a portfolio manager of the fund. | 9/21 |
| ORILX | North Square Multi Strategy | Oak Ridge Investments, LLC is no longer serving as the sub-adviser to the fund. | NSI Retail Advisors, LLC will serve as a new sub-advisor to the fund. | 9/21 |
| MSILX | PartnerSelect International Fund, formerly Litman Gregory PartnerSelect International Fund | Following a change in sub-advisors, value investors David Marcus, Fabio Paolini and Benjamin Beneche will no longer serve as portfolio managers for the fund. | Todd Morris and Daniel Fields join David Herro, Jeremy DeGroot, Mark Little, and Rajiv Jain on the management team. | 9/21 |
| SVDHX | Savos Dynamic Hedging | Jason Thomas is no longer listed as a portfolio manager of the fund. | Steven Wang has join Matthew Goff in managing for the fund. | 9/21 |
| LCG | Sterling Capital Focus Equity ETF | Effective September 28, 2021, Colin Ducharme and Jeremy Lopez will serve as portfolio managers of the fund. | 9/21 | |
| SMDPX | Sterling Capital SMID Opportunities | Joshua Haggerty and Adam Bergman are no longer listed as portfolio managers for the fund. | Effective August 31, 2021, Lee Houser and James Curtis will now serve as portfolio managers of the fund. | 9/21 |
| SUPRX | Superfund Managed Futures Strategy Fund | Gerhard Entzmann is out. | Tennyson Briggs will now manage the fund. | 9/21 |
| TASCX | Third Avenue Small-Cap Value | Evan Strain is no longer managing the fund. | Victor Cunningham continues to serve as the portfolio manager of the fund. | 9/21 |
| HIEMX | Virtus Vontobel Emerging Markets Opportunities Fund | Brian Bandsma will no longer be a portfolio manager of the fund. | Ramiz Chelat joins Matthew Benkendorf and Jin Zhang in managing the fund. | 9/21 |
| WFGGX | WCM Focused Global Growth Fund | Effective December 31, 2021, Kurt Winrich will retire and no longer serve as portfolio manager of the fund. | Sanjay Ayer, Paul Black, Peter Hunkel, and Michael Trigg will continue to manage the fund. | 9/21 |
| WCMRX | WCM Focused International Growth Fund | Effective December 31, 2021, Kurt Winrich will retire and no longer serve as portfolio manager of the fund. | Sanjay Ayer, Paul Black, Peter Hunkel, and Michael Trigg will continue to manage the fund. | 9/21 |
