Surging customer numbers pushes Kiwi Wealth past $5 billion

22 November 2017

Surging customer numbers and performance pushes Kiwi Wealth past $5 billion mark

New Zealand investment manager and KiwiSaver scheme provider Kiwi Wealth now manages more than $5 billion in funds on behalf of New Zealanders, capping a stellar year for customer growth and fund performance.

Kiwi Wealth added $815 million in funds under management in the year to September, with strong investment returns and member inflows into the Kiwi Wealth KiwiSaver Scheme and private portfolio services.

“The success of our global investment philosophy is shown in the performance we’ve achieved for our customers in the past year,” said Susan Easton, Kiwi Wealth’s Head of Investment Strategy.

Kiwi Wealth is a wholly New Zealand-owned fund manager specialising in providing Kiwis with global investment management expertise to diversify investments.

“Global equities have performed strongly and our global approach, coupled with carefully considered active management, has driven exceptional returns.”

The performance of key funds in the Kiwi Wealth KiwiSaver Scheme had been a standout. In the Melville Jessup Weaver Investment Survey, both the Growth and Balanced funds were ranked top performers for the year, with the Conservative fund ranked third.

The Growth fund returned 16.5% for the year (after fees and before tax), the Balanced fund 10.6% and the Conservative fund 4.8%.

Of the more than $5b in funds now under management, 70% is in the Kiwi Wealth KiwiSaver Scheme, consolidating Kiwi Wealth’s position as the New Zealand’s largest, wholly locally-owned KiwiSaver provider. Remaining Kiwi Wealth funds under management are in private portfolios and the Kiwi Wealth Super Scheme.

Joe Bishop, Kiwi Wealth General Manager Customer, Product and Innovation, said that while surpassing the $5 billion funds milestone was important, strong growth in customer numbers was even more pleasing.

Kiwi Wealth added 19,938 KiwiSaver members in the 12 months to September 30, taking total membership to 184,868.

“That’s testament to the work we’ve done in the past year to further enhance our digital Future You tool to help our members make good decisions with their KiwiSaver investment.

“We also built and launched what is one of New Zealand’s leading responsible investment solutions, making us the only default KiwiSaver provider in the country to have all our funds certified by the Responsible Investment Association Australasia.”

The importance of a considered, risk-minded active management approach was crucial because of continued domestic and international economic uncertainty.

“That’s creating the potential for some headwinds at home and abroad,” said Mr Bishop. “When Kiwis consider that they already have lot of exposure to domestic markets, be it through their jobs and homes, the need for expertise in accessing larger, global markets is essential to manage risk and maximise returns.

“If you have everything going in one direction the danger is that everything falls at the same time, so what we do is balance risk and reward by giving Kiwis the opportunity to truly diversify.”

ENDS

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