An alternative guide to... fund managers (rock stars of finance?)
Have you ever wondered who lives in the big houses on the outskirts of town?
You know, the really big ones with improbable numbers of wide, shiny cars in driveways guarded on either side by giant alabaster statues of lions and dogs and griffins?
The answer, I'm pleased to be able to reveal today, is thus:
- Drug smugglers
- Terror warlords
- That bloke of the telly, and...
- ... fund managers
If you're not familiar with all of these professions, the chances are it will be the last one on the list that is causing the most trouble.
But you ignore fund managers at your peril. Like their neighbours they're a secretive bunch who earn hundreds of thousands of pounds a year and get paid massive bonuses just for doing a few lucrative deals. The difference, however, is that while terror and television types want to run the country, fund managers probably actually do.
According to figures out this week, fund managers control more than £350,000,000,000 of our money - that's enough, for want of a better comparision, to buy a brand new Ford Fiesta EVERY SINGLE DAY FOR 125,000 YEARS. It's also enough to buy almost two brand new Ford Fiesta for every working person in Britain should anyone actually want one. (Sorry James).
Got it? Fund managers are important but what on earth is it that they actually do?
The answer, I'm pleased to be able to reveal today, is thus:
Where shop managers look after their stock, their staff and customers (or not) and human resources managers don't do anything at all ever, fund managers (have you guessed yet?) manage funds.
Funds, like fund managers, are also very important. So important that they even have their own supermarkets.
OK, so what's a fund? Here goes... A fund is simply a clever way of allowing people like you and me to invest in a range of going-places companies without the risk and hassle of buying shares in each company individually.
It is the fund manager's job to decide which companies are going places and which they shouldn't touch with a barge pole.
Companies they shouldn't touch include:
- Oil exploration companies that break their drill on the only day that B&Q is closed then try to make the hole anyway with the screwdriver.
- Car manufacturers that create models called things like Allegro, which means medium fast, then compound the error by making a brown one.
- Online travel companies that insist you contact them uniquely by email but apparently refuse point-blank to ever answer the emails leaving you in the lurch without proof of your reservation thus sapping any confidence you had in the whole internet and e-commerce revolution.
The trouble is... and in spite of their jaw-sagging salaries, a lot of fund managers don't seem to be very good at their jobs. They frequently throw our money at such companies and as a result their funds are called dogs. I dunno, maybe they've just got very short barge poles. Or like pets.
On the flipside, some fund managers are so successful and have made so much money for their investors that they're revered in the same way that doting fans worship Robbie Williams and Noel Edmonds. 
One such star is Anthony Bolton, who is so successful and has made so much money for investors, that the powers that be are turning people away and breaking up the band. I mean the fund.
Wouldn't it be great, therefore, if you could find out which companies the star fund managers are keeping an eye on so you could maybe learn the secret to vast wealth?
Well you can. (See Useful links below).
Richard Browning - This is Money
Useful links
> Read Fundwatch in Tips & tactics
- Every month our investment reporter asks a leading fund managers which companies they are thinking of investing in
> Read the latest fund tips from our panel of advisers
> Look up funds by management company
> Compare funds in a performance table with our power portfolio
> Compare funds with our charting tool
And finally ...
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