Ms Solomon says: “We have a multi-asset target return fund. It’s a team approach and a cost-aware solution with active asset allocation. We are engaged in that for the future, but I see that as more for the discretionary audience.
“Where we have had a lot of success with financial advisers is our multi-index funds. That was one of the key attractions: the range of risk-targeted strategies is ideal for growth and income needs.”
In the more immediate future, Ms Solomon has bigger issues to contend with. Most asset managers have spent the final weeks of the summer deciding whether they will shoulder the cost of external investment research once Mifid II unbundles this from trading costs next January. The vast majority have now decided to take those costs on to balance sheets.
LGIM has yet to confirm its post-Mifid position. Meanwhile, its January 2016 decision to unbundle costs ahead of time – and pass on these charges to clients via higher fund fees – has left it isolated.
Ms Solomon describes LGIM’s position as flexible and opens the door to a change of heart.
“What we were pushing for is transparency of cost and to make sure we were a first mover. But it is something we are looking more and more into as things evolve. We are continually looking,” she adds.
Aside from this issue, she says the company’s focus over the next 12 months will be a variation on a familiar theme: “More of the same; diversify by client, and diversify by product”.
CV
Honor Solomon
2014 – present
Head of retail distribution Emea, Legal and General Investment Management
2009 – 2014
Managing director, London discretionary team, BlackRock
2006 – 2009
Director, institutional sales, BlackRock
2001 – 2006
Global relationship management, global markets and investment banking, Merrill Lynch
