Sun Life unit corners P9-B assets under management

Sun Life Asset Management Co. (SLAMC) has cornered over P9 billion in assets under management (AUM), the third largest among the country’s mutual fund players.

"As of Oct. 13, the total AUM of the seven Sun Life Prosperity Funds reached P9.011 billion. That’s a phenomenal growth in just six and a half years," said Lorenzo Tan, chief executive officer and president.

SLAMC opened its venture into the country’s mutual fund industry with a seed capital of P150 million in April 2000.

At the end of September this year, the total net assets of the industry stood at about P44 billion.

Tan attributed the fund growth to SLAMC’s strict adherence to professional and transparent business practices. The company gives more importance to providing professional investment advice and services in contrast to those promising guaranteed returns in a volatile market.

Tan said investors remained with the funds during a dip in bond prices as a result of the rise in interest rates last May. In fact, asset managers claimed they attracted new investors while encouraging existing investors to put in more.

This has resulted in sales of its balanced funds consistently surpassing other funds in the same category, Tan pointed out.

SLAMC chief operating officer Henry Joseph Herrera added that the balanced fund investors practically doubled their money in three years and eight months from January 2003 to August 2006.

"It has generated a net return of over 100 percent on hard-earned money. And if they stayed with us until Sept 2006, their actual yield would have gone up to over 106.6 percent," Herrera said.

The other Sun Life Prosperity Funds managed to provide exceptional returns from January 2003 to September 2006, with the Prosperity Bond Fund, for instance, generating a net return of 39.9 percent.

However, the best performing fund was the Sun Life Prosperity Philippine Equity Fund, which generated 131.5-percent net return.

SLAMC manages seven funds invested in bonds, government securities, equities, dollar denominated, money market, and a balanced (combination of equities and bond) funds.

These are the Prosperity Bond Fund, Prosperity Balanced Fund, Prosperity Philippine Equity Fund, Prosperity Money Market Fund, Prosperity GS (government securities) Fund, Dollar Advantage Fund, and the Dollar Abundance Fund.

SLAMC has 2,700 agents of which 466 are full-time mutual fund advisors.

The agency force contributes 54 percent of investible funds, 20 percent coming from the full-time advisors, and the remaining 26 percent coming from brokers and bank partners.

Some of its bank partners are the Malayan Bank (MayBank), Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corp. (HSBC), United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB), and Standard Chartered Bank of the Philippines (SCBP).