KEY POINTS:
The name plate of New Zealand's newest fund management firm is made out of paper, the office is a spartan room full of drafting tables sublet from an architect. And the day the Business Herald visited, the business cards had not been returned from the printer.
However, if former ING chief investment officer Rebecca Thomas and business partner Mark Ford, ING's former head of institutional funds, now lack the trappings of high finance, they make up for it in ambition. Within four years, the duo - with the help of a couple of yet-to-be-named recruits - want to take their firm Mint Asset Management from a start-up to a company managing $1 billion of shares, bonds and currency.
Thomas, who led and then later sold a listed funds management company in Britain, said after two years with ING she wanted to take control of her own destiny.
The impending introduction of the kiwisaver work-place savings regime, the introduction of a harsher disclosure regime around advisers and tax changes that will put funds on an equal footing with individual investors created a real opportunity for growth.
"The changes occurring are perhaps of greater magnitude than we have probably seen in the last 15 years. New Zealand is going to be much more like other international markets that I am experienced in so I think there will be a growth opportunity in active management," Thomas said.
Starting with a clean sheet in such an environment was preferable to trying to adapt products developed in the previous regulatory regime.
The duo had been talking vaguely about what a start-up funds management company would look like for some time. So, the plan came together after Thomas decided she was ready to make the move. The business is shared 60/40 between Thomas and Ford with start-up funding of about $2.5 million.
Thomas said their investment funds would be total return funds measuring performance against what could be achieved by investing cash in short-term bank deposits. It would charge a base fee linked to funds under management that reflected the actual costs of management and a performance above the benchmark.
Mint was able to charge lower fees because distribution costs would not be bundled with the management fee.
The funds - made up of cash currency, fixed interest, and equities - would be offered to retail investors, but Mint would also seek mandates from institutions and fund distributors.
"The real money here is not in equities, it is in yield products," Thomas said.
"We have the highest interest rates in the world so the benchmark is pretty high in terms of the actual return people expect to achieve."
