Meet the 2022 Asset Managers of the Year

Envestnet | PMC and Investment Advisor magazine announced the 2022 winners of its 18th annual Asset Manager of the Year Awards Wednesday night at a ceremony during the Envestnet Advisor Summit in Charlotte, North Carolina.

We presented awards for eight asset categories, as well as for one overall winner; the award winners were selected from thousands of managers on the Envestnet platform.

The overall Asset Manager of the Year was Hartford Schroders International Stock Fund (SCIEX), which also won the top manager award in the Sustainable category, the first in that category to win the top honor.

The fund, led by co-portfolio managers Simon Webber and James Gautry, was up 11.4% in 2021, outpacing its benchmark by 3.6%, largely due to stock selection despite factor and stylistic headwinds, according to Envestnet analysts.

The fund is a large-cap international core equity strategy with a growth tilt and a quality bias that consists of 50 to 70 stocks with dynamic exposure to emerging markets, and has averaged returns of 13% over the past five years.

The category has grown dramatically in number of managers, according to Tim Clift, chief investment strategist of Envestnet | PMC. In fact, one aspect noted by the judges during selection process is Hartford Schroders practices sustainability principles throughout all its funds.

Other winners include one of the Large Cap winners, Wakefield Large Cap Equity fund, which returned 35% in 2021, outperforming the Russell 1000 Index by about 9%.

The fund’s portfolio manger, G. Todd Gervasini, founded the group in 2003 and built the proprietary system behind the firm’s process in the late 1990s. The key to its approach is its exploitation of earnings surprises, as it seeks to take advantage of both mispricings and earnings revisions.

Capital Wealth Enhanced Dividend Income Portfolio won the Liquid Alternatives category for its “excellent job in delivering strong and consistent performance, balancing total return and income generation, and conducing active option overlay,” according to Envestnet analysts.

The fund has been exceptional over the long term, matching its benchmark of the Dow Jones Industrial Average since its inception in 2013. The fund is led by Kevin Simpson, founder and chief investment officer.

Another notable was in the Specialty category: Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure Fund. The fund had a return of 19.82%, versus its FTSE Global Core Infrastructure benchmark of 17.93%. The fund focuses on value-oriented stocks of “preferred infrastructure” firms that “exhibit high revenue and profit certainty due to their usually regulated and monopolistic market positioning and long-term, inflation-linked contracts,” according to Envestnet analysts.

Here are the winners in each category:

• Sustainable and Asset Manager of the Year: Hartford Schroders International Stock Fund
• Multi-Asset Strategist: SSI Flexible Allocation Portfolio
• Liquid Alternatives: Capital Wealth Enhanced Dividend Income Portfolio
• Specialty: Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure Fund
• Global, International, Emerging Market: Acadian International ADR SMA
• Fixed Income: Federated Hermes Total Return Bond Fund
• Large Cap Equity: Wakefield Large Cap Equity and Alley Dividend Portfolio
• Small, Smid, Mid Cap Equity: Congress Mid Cap Growth and Tributary Small Cap