Select a page

Banking News

Bendigo adds to funds management capabilities

Bendigo adds to funds management capabilities

(27 May 2013 – Australia) Bendigo Bank officially launched the next step in its Bendigo Wealth platform – with the Sandhurst Strategic Income Fund.

The bank said while those with a mortgage can start to breathe a little easier, those relying on income from investments such as term deposits and savings accounts are faced with increasing bills for energy and fuel and may be in less of a position to afford luxury expenses.

Bendigo Wealth was launched in April 2011 and brought several parts of the business together under the one umbrella - including Sandhurst Trustees which was founded 125 years ago this year.

The Income Fund joins other product launches since Bendigo Wealth’s inauguration, namely, Bendigo SmartStart Super and the Bendigo managed wholesale fund product suite (comprising 10 managed funds).

Head of Wealth Markets, Alexandra Tullio said Bendigo Bank is increasingly recognised for its funds management capability, particularly by independent financial advisers.

"We recognise that there are many Bendigo customers especially those approaching or already in retirement with existing term deposits who are looking for regular income and good returns. They’re looking for that happy medium with an experienced funds manager.

"Understandably, these customers are risk averse. They’re not considering bonds, and term deposit returns are lower than they’d like - but they’re not yet ready to venture back into the equities market either.

"We’ve used our years of wealth management experience to build the Income Fund as a stepping stone between investment classes such as bonds, term deposits and equities. We’re saying that the Income Fund is well qualified to be in that sweet spot as a customer’s first and perhaps logical alternative to a term deposit", Tullio said.

Paul Rohan, Head of Sandhurst Trustees said: "Sandhurst’s income fund is a low risk investment with quarterly income distributions. But unlike a term deposit funds can be accessed weekly without penalty and there’s no need for rollovers."
"To those investors who may not have considered Bendigo for our wealth management capability, we’re saying perhaps you should come and have a look at our product range. A particular feather in our cap is that we were one of just a handful of Australian fund managers who didn’t freeze redemptions in our mortgage funds during the GFC", Rohan said.

Australia Ratings has assigned its credit rating of ‘A’ to the units issued by the Sandhurst Strategic Income Fund.

Australia Ratings is the only domestic rating agency that can issue credit ratings to financial products offered to retail investors in Australia.

Through their independent assessment of financial products Australia Ratings assigns ratings to differentiate the degree of credit worthiness of organisations and fixed income products available to investors in the Australian financial market.
A rating of ‘A’ indicates the Fund has a strong degree of protection against loss from credit risk on the rating scale used by Australia Ratings and reflects the credit quality of the Fund’s investments as well as the experience and skill of Sandhurst Trustees as the Investment Manager.

East & Partners's avatar

Comment on this article

 

Your comments will not be published. Required fields are marked *

 

Please enter the word you see in the image below:


Subscribe

Subscribe to our mailing list

Sign up now to keep up-to-date with the latest
market news and insights in B2B banking.

* indicates required

For more information please read our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Statements.