Alexander Forbes (AF) has had an intriguing evolution. It was once the place to go for objective advice on product providers. It moved from there to pension fund administration, another low-margin activity. In what I consider a lapse of ethics it used the credibility it had built up as a trusted adviser to shoehorn clients into group products, notably Investment Solutions (IS).If a fund is looking for a travel agent, look no further. IS has been brilliant at planning trips to Russia and China, not to mention the annual Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) junket.But as a fund aggregator IS has its shortcomings, as even the Alexander Forbes multimanager survey shows. Over three years it has been bottom of the pure equity and absolute return categories, for example. Maybe it should change its name to Investment Problems. The former head of AF, Edward Kieswetter, should have encouraged the consultants to move business when it was in the interest of their clients. But he pushed for aggress...
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