Premier Miton has hired Russell Champion from RWC to its European equities team and plans to launch a responsible and sustainable European ex-UK equity fund later in the year.
Champion is expected to join the team, which is headed up by Carlos Moreno and includes fund manager Thomas Brown, later this year. He is currently part of the European team that manages the RWC Continental European Equity and RWC European Equity funds.
His previous roles include being partner and assistant portfolio manager at Pensato Capital with a particular focus on small cap, technology and media stocks, as well as equity analyst at Fidelity International.
Champion said: "I am excited to join Premier Miton's top performing European equities investment team and I am looking forward to working with Carlos Moreno and Thomas Brown on the existing fund and new fund.
"As the team has proved over a number of years, Europe is home to extremely compelling companies and actively stock picking these opportunities can deliver strong results for clients."
The new sustainable European equity fund, which is planned for launch later in 2021, is set to build on the success of the Premier Miton European Opportunities fund, run by Brown and Moreno, which recently reached its five-year anniversary.
It is the top performing fund in the IA Europe ex UK sector over five years to 13 January, returning 186% over the period versus a sector average of 63%. It is a multi-cap fund with a mid-cap bias.
The new fund will be based on the same investment philosophy and approach and managed by the same team, headed by Moreno, but with a responsible and sustainable focus and an emphasis on larger companies.
Moreno said: "I am delighted Russell is joining our European equities team, providing additional expert investment analysis to help us with the running of the European Opportunities fund and our planned new responsible, sustainable and larger company focused fund.
"Post-Brexit, and as the Covid vaccines are rolled out across the continent, the investment landscape in Europe will continue to change but we are sure it will also continue to present significant opportunities which can be effectively harnessed via our proven, active investment approach."
CIO Neil Birrell added: "The launch of a new responsible and sustainable European equity fund will expand our investment range of ESG and responsible investing themed funds, alongside our global equity sustainable growth and income funds, our ethical UK equity fund and global renewable energy investment trust.
"We believe that our track record in ethical and sustainable funds, together with the high performance and reputation of our European equity team, means we have an attractive range which caters for the strong and growing demand for these types of investment funds."
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