Aviva merges manager of manager range into multi-asset suite

Aviva Investors has merged three manager of manager funds into its multi-asset portfolios.

The group, which has failed to attract substantial inflows into the manager of manager range, has merged its £11m MoM Cautious fund into the £6.2m Aviva Investors Cautious Multi-asset fund.

Meanwhile, the £18.7m Balanced fund has merged into the £8m Balanced Multi-asset fund, while the £10.3m MoM Growth fund has become part of the £1.5m Aviva Investors Adventurous Multi-asset fund.

The merger is scheduled to go through on 1 July after being approved by shareholders in an EGM on 16 June.

The group is also reviewing the £0.9m MoM Income fund, but said it does not have a multi-asset equivalent.

All three of the multi-asset funds are headed up by Justin Onuekwusi, who took over the range last November.

The move comes after Aviva earlier this year brought the group's £1.3bn multi-manager mandates in-house.

Aviva Investors took over the manager of manager range, which was previously outsourced to Close Investments, as part of the change.

The group also brought inhouse its funds of funds range from FundQuest. Ian Aylward and Peter Fitzgerald, senior portfolio managers at the group, head up the suite.

Aviva has made its multi-asset funds part of its core offering, having strengthened its team at the end of March with the appointment of Bev Shah who joined from Aviva's UK Life business and Isabel Pilkington who moved from Standard Life. Multi-asset funds are also increasingly attracting the attention of advisers as many look at outsourcing investment decisions in the run-up to RDR.