Royal London UK Equity Income fund has lost its FundCalibre Elite Rating and come under formal review by interactive investor following the announcement of manager Martin Cholwill's retirement.
Control of the £1.7bn fund will be handed to deputy manager Richard Marwood, who joined Cholwill in managing the vehicle in 2016.
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As a result, the fund has lost its Elite Rating, with Darius McDermott, managing director of FundCalibre, stating that "although Richard Marwood has been deputy manager for a while, the fund's performance track record was that of Martin and, as such, the fund will have to lose its Elite Rating".
He added: "Martin has been a superb manager over the years, and we wish him well for his retirement."
Cholwill's retirement has been deemed a "yellow card event" by interactive investor, which has placed the Super 60 rated fund "under formal review".
This will result in a "thorough investigation" being conduct by analysts, which includes an interview with the investment manager, and a decision should be reached "one way or another within three months of the date when the investment was placed under formal review".
Dzmitry Lipski, head of fund research, interactive investor, said: "We have decided to put Royal London UK Equity Income fund under formal review following the announcement that its lead fund manager Martin Cholwill will retire later this year. Richard Marwood, who has been deputy manager of the fund since 2016, will become co-fund manager until Cholwill retires, and then will become lead manager of the fund.
"In-line with our methodology, we will review how this change will impact the fund's team structure and investment process along with how the succession plan will be implemented and the timeframe for that.
"As Martin was the key decision-maker for the strategy and has managed the fund since 2005, we need to do an additional layer of due diligence in order to establish whether it will continue to be a suitable core option for our UK Equity Income category.
"We will communicate with the team at Royal London, review the fund's portfolio and make a decision when more information is gathered and analysed."
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Adrian Lowcock, head of personal investing at Willis Owen, added: "Martin Cholwill's retirement will naturally be disappointing news for investors, but Royal London are well placed to manage the handover and there is plenty of time so investors don't need to panic and sell the fund.
"New manager Richard Marwood has worked closely for many years with Martin at Royal London and previous employers. He runs the UK Dividend Growth fund on a similar philosophy and process and has also stepped in to support on previous occasions, so this is as clean a handover as one can get."
