BlackRock saw net sales double to just under £4bn, with the firm benefitting from a shift towards low-cost products by wealth managers and discretionaries.

The group also topped the gross sales table, its £9.9bn in sales representing a 33 per cent increase on the 2013 figure. Some 80 per cent of gross sales came from passive funds (those funds that seek to replicate an index).

BlackRock was followed in the net rankings by Woodford IM, top seller in the second and third quarter following its launch in June, and Henderson. Woodford remained top seller in Q4, with estimated net sales of £1.1bn, followed by BlackRock (£1bn) and Standard Life Investments (£770m).

“BlackRock was a clear beneficiary of a shift towards index trackers last year, particularly among large wealth managers/quasi-institutional discretionary managers looking for low cost core solutions,” Helen Pridham, the report’s editor, said.

Artemis and Royal London Asset Management also benefitted from the demand for equity income products, seeing net sales of £2.1bn and £1bn respectively during 2015.

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Property funds saw 150 per cent growth in net sales to reach £3.8bn, causing managers to admit they were struggling to deal with the huge inflows. The top-selling funds in the space were M&G Property and Henderson UK Property.

Pridham said: “M&G was one of the first to convert its fund to a tax-efficient PAIF and others have followed. Henderson’s revival last year was very much boosted by increasing sales of its high-yielding property fund.”

 

Company	Net retail sales in 2014
BlackRock	£4bn
Woodford IM	£3.9bn
Henderson	£2.6bn
Standard Life Investment	£2.6bn
Artemis	£2.2bn
Old Mutual Global Investors	£1.9bn
Royal London	£1.0bn
Kames	£1.0bn
HSBC Global Asset Management	£900m
Fundsmith	£850m

 Source: Pridham Report