The adviser view: What is a fair price for active management?

Survey on fund fees

After nearly three decades in the industry, I have never seen the issue of fund fees being as dominant as it is today. This prompted us to team up with Incisive Media to ask financial advisers what they consider to be a fair price for active management, writes Ravenscroft's Mark Harries.

Looking at the survey results, some 59% of respondents suggested a fair price for active management was represented by meeting a client's individual investment objective, while in second place - with 31% of responses - was a fund outperforming its benchmark over five years, net of fees. We also asked whether price drives clients' investment decisions. Unsurprisingly, some 57% of responses suggested it does sometimes, whereas only 7% said it always impacts decisions. However, encouragingly for the industry, some 73% were focused more on the value delivered than price. Therefore, the me...