Stanbic IBTC, FBN Quest and Meristem Securities were the top mutual funds actively managed by professional stock pickers by total returns in Nigeria for 2024.
MoneyCentral’s analysis of Securities and Exchange Commissions (SEC) mutual fund data for 2024, shows that for equity funds with at least N500 million in net asset value, Stanbic IBTC’s Aggressive Fund came tops with gains of 47.08% last year.
This was followed by FBN Nigeria Smart Beta Equity Fund by FBN Quest, which rose by 42.1% in 2024, Stanbic IBTC’s Nigeria Equity Fund up 38.92% and Meristem’s Equity Market Fund up 37.21% to make up the top 4.
FBNQuest is the Investment Banking and Asset Management subsidiary of FirstHoldCo Plc.
Stanbic’s Equity Fund is the largest with Net Asset Value of N12.53 billion, making up 40.18 percent of the total. FBN’s Smart Beta Fund had assets under management of N1.154 billion, equivalent to 3.7 percent of total equity fund assets, while Meristem’s Equity fund assets were N738 million or 2.37 percent of the total.
NGX All Share Index, the benchmark for the Equity Funds was up 37.7 percent in 2024. Total assets for all Equity Funds were N31.203 billion as at 27, December 2024 according to SEC data.
Not pure equity plays
One caveat to note however is that not most of the funds are not pure equity plays. Take the largest one of them the Stanbic IBTC Nigeria Equity Fund.
According to its fund description:
“The Stanbic IBTC Nigeria Equity Fund gives investors access to a wide array of equity investments which are simply stocks traded on the floor of the Nigerian stock exchange. The fund aims to achieve long-term capital appreciation by investing a minimum 70% of its assets in listed equities and a maximum of 30% in fixed income securities.”
Meristems equity market fund notes in its fund description that: “it is a high risk fund, that invests in a combination of fixed income instruments like treasury bills, commercial papers, fixed deposit and call placement.”
The FBN Quest Smart Beta Equity Fund says it is “a conventional mutual fund that invests primarily in a portfolio of listed Nigerian companies, backed by a rigorous, research-based, and time-tested assessment approach. This fund preserves capital over time by investing at least 75% of its assets (excluding cash and cash equivalents) in a diversified portfolio of high-quality companies listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange. To manage liquidity, the fund may also invest up to 25% of its assets in short-term money market instruments and bank deposits.”
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