Piet Viljoen, portfolio manager of the Merchant West SCI Worldwide Flexible Fund, acknowledges that the fund’s annualised 2.8% return over the last 10 years is poor form.
He admitted flaws in the management process from a balanced fund-centric view of the world to a process change in August 2020 to a more globally oriented asset allocation, with less emphasis on benchmark relative allocations.
Despite some public perception and a steep benchmark of inflation plus 6%, Viljoen believes the fund’s performance has been much stronger since the change.