Spanish funds with more than a billion euros in assets they were doubled since 2019 until reaching the figure of 86 products. If five years ago there were 47 “billionaire” funds managing a volume of 109.672 million, today this figure rises to almost ninety vehicles, with assets of 194.568 million, according to Vdos data.
This growth has occurred especially in recent years, in the heat of central banks raising interest rates to stop inflation, which has caused the launch of target return funds with sovereign debt in portfolio or even bond assets benefiting from the new monetary environment. And also for him development of discretionary management by financial institutionswhich allowed the funds used to build the portfolios to reach a significant size. BBVA 2024 II Bonds either CaixBank Public Debt 2025for example, are among the twenty largest Spanish funds, with almost 3 billion in assets for the first or 2,760 million for the second.
This trend is confirmed by the analysis of data from just three years ago, when there were already 70 funds with a volume of over one billion euros. And it must be taken into account that currently, the distribution of funds through discretionary management portfolios already represents 25% of the total (which reaches almost 73% if we include advice), according to Inverco data from the second quarter of this year.
The fact that the majority profile of Spanish investors is conservative explains why the largest funds have always been those aimed at this broad group of participants. In fact, historically, the Quality conservative investment BBVA’s holds the title of the most gigantic national fund, which exceeded 10 billion in 2019. Today, it manages much less (5.655 million euros), but it still remains among the ten largest Spanish funds, and remains the second in its category on Morningstar, global defensive mixed products in euros, behind only the M&G (Lux) Optimal Incomewhich has more than 9.7 billion.
Now that inflation is easing and central banks are trying harder to avoid a sudden slowdown in the economy, entities are redirecting their clients to other conservative funds, as the maturity of their products with a profitability objective approaches, as is the case of CaixaBank, towards its monetary fund, to the point that it has already reached a size greater than 17 billion eurosthe largest in the history of the Spanish investment sector, while three years ago it managed less than 4 billion.
Where the hand of discretionary management is appreciated is in the volume of funds such as CaixaBank Master Variable Income USA Recommended bywhich is the second Spanish vehicle, with 8.560 million euros, the CaixaBank Master RF Public Debt 3-10which has 6.725 million, which places it in fourth place, behind the Quality Moderate investmentwith 8.518 million.
Compared to funds from international management companies, Spanish funds are the smallest, since of the almost 8,000 vehicles from foreign management companies available for sale in Spain, 13% exceed one billion in asset volume, while in national funds it is reduced to less than 3%.
Independent managers
Although these almost ninety Spanish funds already “billionaires” may seem a relevant figure, it should be remembered that Spanish managers have an offer of 3,227 collective investment vehicles. And these large funds are generally concentrated in financial institutions. The fund of an independent manager with the largest volume of assets is the Azvalor Internationalwith 1.958 million, according to Morningstar, followed by bestinfondwith 1,496 million.
One of the recurring complaints of independent firms is the obstacles they encounter when it comes to distributing their funds through the networks of financial entities, which limits the capacity to grow their assets under management, something that can only be mitigated by marketing through Luxembourg for private banking channels. And this ends up influencing the size of Spanish funds compared to their competitors.
Cases such as that of Dunas Valor Prudente, which has just reached 1 billion euros in assets, are in this sense an exception, and can only be explained by the interest shown above all by the institutional clients it addresses, such as insurance companies.
