Asset Allocator has discovered a rather eye-watering statistic to share with you today. 

Allianz Strategic Bond experienced more than £800mn in outflows in May, according to data from Morningstar Direct, following Mike Riddell’s announcement he would be joining Fidelity in July. 

£819mn, to be precise. Yikes. 

That’s not including an extra £169mn pulled from the Luxembourg version of his fund, which, when you add them together, totals nigh-on £1bn of woe.

This means Allianz Strategic Bond has shrunk from £1.4bn in January to just over £500mn now – and is down from £3.2bn at its peak in May 2021. 

Why so? Consistent poor performance and a mistimed duration call, mainly. 

Indeed Asset Allocator recently covered its travails, pointing out that in two of the past three years, Allianz Strategic Bond was the absolute worst performer in its sector, and that year-to-date, it is claiming that unwanted crown again.

His mandate had the longest duration by some distance of any strategic bond fund in our database, at well over 10 years.

Some of the allocators who held his fund have sold up already: as of today, four remain compared to six last year. 

The team at Quilter Cirilium told us they are still in the process of making a decision on this fund, indicating there’s potentially more pain to come for Allianz successor Julian Le Beron. 

You can read more about the recent malaise of strategic bond funds, here.