St James’s Place – Ethical & Sustainable Strategies

When handling SJP complaints for our customers there tend to be 3 common causes for concern

1- The fees they have paid

Whether they paid fees up front or they were built into their annual costs, very often clients are surprised by the the total costs of fees to SJP especially when they realise that the fees they paid could have been earning interest.

2- A lack of servicing

Most St James’s Place advisers visit clients in their homes and build a strong rapport and relationship with their customers. However, many have then failed to maintain those relationships in spite of charging annual fees which are supposed to be for the purposes of carrying out annual reviews.

3. Performance of the SJP portfolios

This is a contentious issues as all investors should remember that past performance is not an indicator of future results and that all investments can go up and down. If you did take a product with SJP almost they almost certainly would have selected products from their range that are appropriate for you.

However, what if you were transferring into SJP from an existing pension scheme, ISA or investment platform?

At that point don’t you need to ask the question:

• Did you actually need to move to SJP to pay higher fees?
• Was it made clear to you that these products were more expensive and that SJP don’t have access to whole of market?
• What position would you have been in if the SJP adviser had not have transferred your investment?

You can bring this complaint to SJP yourself and if they have failed to service you, they will most likely offer you some financial redress.

However, if you transferred into SJP from an existing scheme, as experts in Mis-Sold Pension and Investments we would look to instruct an accurate valuation for you to make sure that the redress actually represents the true loss you may have suffered.

To learn more why not book a free consultation today.

Below are details of industry report into how SJP’s 3 Ethical and Sustainable strategies have performed.

 Ethical and sustainable strategies continue to rank among the poorest performers across all equity funds, as highlighted by Bestinvest’s latest analysis on consistent underperformance, with SJP being no exception.

SJP had three funds featured in this edition of the report, with total assets amounting to £12.6 billion. This marks a significant improvement, as it represents a decrease of £6 billion over the past six months.

The report acknowledges that this is not a bad result for SJP, given that Britain’s largest wealth manager operates around 45 funds.

However, the figures for one of these funds are particularly striking, with the £10.7 billion Global Quality fund accounting for the bulk of its assets included in the list.

Similar to the challenges faced by sustainable funds, Bestinvest pointed out that this fund struggled due to being ‘underweight’ in energy stocks. It delivered a return of just 5.9% during the period, underperforming the MSCI World by 27%.

Interestingly, SJP’s Global Emerging Markets fund remained on the list, despite the decision to switch the underlying manager to Robeco late last year and reduce its charges.

Justin Onuekwusi, SJP’s chief investment officer, noted that comparisons were not entirely fair, as the performance data of its funds includes a single, ongoing charge.

‘Our funds’ performance is inclusive of our single ongoing charge, which covers costs for the external fund manager, administration, and advice,’ Onuekwusi explained.

‘Most of the funds used for comparison in this analysis do not factor in advice and administration charges. Therefore, it is not a like-for-like comparison. The “unbundling” of our charges in 2025 will make comparisons with our peers more straightforward.’

He also cautioned against over-reliance on the report: ‘In our opinion, investors should be mindful that past performance is not indicative of future results and should view short-term rankings and recommendations with a healthy degree of scepticism.’