Australia’s Bell Asset Management, a boutique equities manager, has won a US$500 million global small and mid-cap equity mandate from Hostplus Super.
Hostplus is a superannuation fund for the hospitality, recreation and tourism industries.
“We look forward to building a strong and long partnership with Hostplus and delivering the best results we possibility can for its members,” Rob Sullivan, Bell’s managing director for strategy and distribution, says in a statement on October 31 announcing the mandate.
According to Sullivan, demand for global small and mid-cap investment strategies are rising as investors search for alpha at relatively lower risk levels compared with other growth strategies.
Bell says its global core strategy has returned 9.3% annually since inception in 2003, outperforming the MSCI World Index by 2.3%.
Melbourne-based Hostplus is one of Australia’s top ten super funds, with A$89 billion ($56.96 billion) of assets and over one million members.
Four months ago, it teamed up US alternatives manager Apollo Global Management to form a $1.25 billion Asia Pacific credit strategy to tap into the region’s private debt market.