BDM Direct to distribute Life Settlements Fund

Melbourne-based fund distributor BDM Direct has been appointed to distribute US-based Life Settlements Wholesale Fund (LSWF) in Australia.

BDM’s brief from LSWF responsible entity Life Settlements Fund Limited is to drive the retail distribution of the fund in Australia via dealer groups and financial planners.

Launched in Australia in October 2004 as the country’s first life settlement fund, LSWF is currently available to wrap investors in Australia via six different platforms.

The fund owns 488 individual whole-of-life insurance policies from 60 US insurance companies, which are held in an open-ended structure until maturity.

It then distributes the payout to the pool of clients who are invested in it through a unit trust, with investors receiving quarterly distributions and dividends.

It achieved FUM of $384M as at the end of June last year and is now in excess of $1.1 billion, including some big institutional mandates, according to BDM national account manager Andrew Fenton.

The retail market’s contribution sitting at $250 million, which, Fenton said, BDM, together with Life Settlements Fund Limited, is “working to increase”.

Fenton said he “hoped to get a good research rating for the fund, which would help to grow its representation on dealer group recommended lists”.

“The existing research is being supplemented by major research houses as the interest in this asset class, with its non-correlation, is growing daily.”

He pitched the fund “alongside international bonds as far as risk goes but with substantial potential for upside, its performance being somewhere in the vicinity of 10 to 12 per cent per annum”.