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Funds averse to offering SMSF access
Two major superannuation funds have indicated they are averse to making their fund accessible to self-managed super funds.
Speaking at the Morningstar Investment Conference in Sydney, Kristian Fok, chief investment at Cbus, and Andrew Lill, chief investment officer at Rest, were asked whether they would follow the lead of Hostplus in making this an option.
Hostplus had offered its Hostplus Self-Managed Invest since June 2019 and offered SMSF investors pre-mixed or sector-specific investment options and access to assets such as private equity and infrastructure.
Both funds had around $70 million in assets under management but said their reluctance lay behind tax implications of the structure.
Fok said: “We haven’t set up a product in order to do so because you have to create a legal structure called pooled superannuation trust to offer it externally and there are quite complex tax issues there.
“Hostplus got in there early and was able to set that up when the unrealised capital gains tax in the fund was probably much less of an issue. For us, it’s a much bigger implication so we don’t offer those products for that reason.”
Lill added: “We wouldn’t rule it out but our biggest challenge right now is focusing on our 1.9 million members value super and enjoy it. Once we’ve done that successfully, I think we will be much more keen to keep the opportunities for further investment from new areas and sources and open up what our team can do.”
AUTHOR
Laura Dew
Laura Dew is editor at Super Review. Prior to joining SR, she spent five years working at Investment Week in the UK covering asset and wealth management.
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