Despite an upcoming manager change, Janus Global Research should remain a solid core holding with a significant cost advantage over its peers.
Greg Carlson: The Medalist of the Week this week is Janus Global Research (JAWWX). This is an analyst-driven fund. It's run by Janus' entire analyst team, which has about 33 people. There is nominally a portfolio manager, director of research Jim Goff. He is retiring in December. Now, he will be replaced in that role, and as a portfolio manager, by Carmel Wellso. She has only been at Janus for six years, but she is highly accomplished. She has made great picks in the financials sector. She has mentored analysts in Janus' Singapore office, and she has about 20 years of investment experience overall.
And as I mentioned, the analyst team has 33 people there. It's an experienced bunch with an average of eight years tenure at Janus and 14 years of total investment experience. The way the portfolio is constructed is that there are seven sector teams and they each construct subportfolios of about 15 to 25 stocks. Now, being that this is Janus, the fund tends to lean to the growth side of the ledger. However, it is run sector-neutral to its benchmark, the MSCI World Index.
The fund has performed quite well since it took on its current mandate in the beginning of 2007. It has beaten more than 85% of its world-stock peers on both a total-return basis and a risk-adjusted basis.
Finally, the fees are pretty low here, significantly cheaper than the typical no-load world-stock fund. There is also a shareholder-friendly performance-adjusted management fee; that's adjusted on a rolling three-year basis versus the fund's benchmark.
Overall, it's a very nice, wide-ranging core holding.
