St James’s Place fund flows ‘hurt by political fears’

Wealth manager St James’s Place struggled after clients sat on their hands due to “unprecedented” political fears, slowing the amount of money flowing into the FTSE 100 group.

Net inflows for the six months to June were £4.4 billion, down from £5.2 billion last time. Extra investment in recruiting advisers also lowered operating profits to £466 million from £490 million.

Shares took a rare mis-step, falling 4%, or 46.20p, to 996.20p.

“We will continue to invest and look through the short-term noise,” said chief executive Andrew Croft. “The political environment is pretty unprecedented and also the macro economic concerns and the US-China trade tensions. So against that backdrop our gross inflows were lower but it’s a very credible performance.”

Customers with spare money to invest are holding back from throwing it onto the stock market amid rising concerns over politics and trade tensions.

Investment Association figures last month showed money flowing into funds is down 80%.

The number of advisers, who help St James’s Place grow funds, rose to 4096, up nearly 4%.

Separately Man Group, the listed fund manager specialising in hedge funds, saw outflows of $1.1 billion but shares rose after assets under management increased.

Assets spiked to $114.4 billion from $108.5 billion thanks to the strong performance of its computer-driven trading division AHL.

Shares rose 3.3%, up 5.5p, to 172.35p.