Craig Bingham

Successful fund manager, Bennelong Funds Management (Bennelong), today announced the appointment of Craig Bingham to the position of Chief Executive Officer (CEO). Craig will join Bennelong on 20 October.

With over 25 years’ experience in the industry, Craig is a highly regarded financial services executive with extensive experience in Australian and international markets. He joins Bennelong from Federated Investors Asia Pacific where he was CEO. Prior to that, he was CEO at Portfolio Partners which later became Aviva Investors Asia Pacific, where he was responsible for establishing and developing licensed asset management businesses in Australia, Singapore and China, and expanding Aviva’s presence in Asia and the Middle East. Under Craig’s leadership, he built the strong-performing, award-winning Aviva Investors brand in the Australian market, opened distribution offices in Taiwan, the Middle East and Japan, and created an enviable corporate culture with a strong profit focus.

“I am thrilled to be joining Bennelong and becoming part of the successful business that has been built over the last six years,” said Craig. “Bennelong have established a fantastic platform for growth and its prospects for the future look great, so it is an exciting time to be leading the business.”

Bennelong Chairman Mike Pratt said, “We are thrilled to have attracted such a highly respected and talented leader. In particular, Craig’s experience leading successful businesses with multiple asset management teams across various asset classes, both locally and internationally, and his background in institutional sales, will be incredibly valuable in helping Bennelong achieve its long-term goals.

“While Bennelong has seen exponential growth in the past six years, our ambition for future success continues to be a key driver. There is still plenty of untapped potential to be explored – the acquisition of new teams and expansion of our distribution footprint, both domestically and globally, are the business’ main focus moving forward. We look forward to broadening Bennelong’s offer under Craig’s leadership.”

Since its establishment in 2008, Bennelong has grown its funds under management to over $6 billion through its four asset management teams, Bennelong Australian Equity Partners, Avoca Investment Management, Kardinia Capital and Bennelong Long Short Equity Management.

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The Fund is managed by Bennelong’s small caps team, Avoca Investment Management, which is headed-up by experienced investment professionals, John Campbell and Jeremy Bendeich. 

Robust research and portfolio construction process
Avoca’s investment process was of particular note in Lonsec’s report, highlighting that Avoca “employs a well structured, robust and repeatable investment process. Whilst the firm was only founded in 2011… Avoca’s investment process is very similar to that used during the investment team’s previous tenure at UBS and therefore can be considered to have been tested through a full market cycle.” 

The team’s five stage investment process “promotes a high level of transparency and leads to a high level of consistency in output,” the report noted. “Avoca have introduced some subtle process enhancements with the inclusion of ESG analysis as part of the fundamental research effort and a more refined financial modelling and valuation framework, tailored specifically for the Australian equity small cap market.” 

Quality people and resources
Lonsec viewed the pairing of Campbell and Bendeich in the portfolio management role as highly favourable, noting that the two were “seasoned investment professionals and pleasingly, a pairing that have developed a reasonably long working relationship together whilst at UBS.”

In summary, Lonsec concluded that “the Campbell and Bendeich portfolio management pairing, significant FUM capacity and highly accountable boutique investment structure form the key attractions of this product.” 

Managing Director of Avoca Investment Management and Portfolio Manager of the Fund, John Campbell, said he was thrilled with Lonsec’s rating, in particular their acknowledgement of Avoca’s robust research and portfolio construction process.

“Jeremy and I believe there is only one way to invest in shares and that’s to do a deep qualitative review of the company in question and its industry, model the long-term maintainable cash flows, and value those cash flows on a DCF basis. This is the process we’ve been operating under for the past eight years and is the heart of Avoca. Lonsec’s acknowledgement of our process and people is a positive affirmation for our business,” John said.

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