T. Rowe Price, Calamos Advisors bring home overall fund company Lipper Awards

Fidelity tops all fund companies with 35 individual fund trophies; Carillon Tower Advisers wins the small-company fixed-income award for the second straight year.

T. Rowe Price Associates was edged out by Fidelity Investments for the most individual fund Lipper Awards this year, but T. Rowe’s overall risk-adjusted performance ranked the Baltimore-based asset manager as the large-company trophy winner for the 12-month period through Nov. 30.

Fidelity set the pace in the 2022 tally with 35 U.S. fund awards, which compares to 24 for T. Rowe. Pacific Investment Management Co. was a close third with 23 total fund awards.

The three other fund companies gathering double-digit trophies this year were Invesco Advisors and Vanguard Group, with 16 each, and Capital Research & Management Co. with 15.

The overall company winner in both the large- and small-company categories is based on risk-adjusted performance across the fund family over the past three years. For that period, T. Rowe had eight funds earning Lipper Awards.

“We are honored and grateful that T. Rowe Price has been recognized with such a prestigious award,” said Eric Veiel, head of global equity at T. Rowe, which has $1.58 trillion in total assets under management.

Veiel went on to say the award “demonstrates the value we bring to our clients and it reflects the impressive strength and depth of the investment professionals we are fortunate to have, including the portfolio managers, analysts and traders who comprise our global research and trading teams.”

Fidelity, which has $4.5 trillion under management, might have fallen short on the overall large-company award, but three of its mutual funds that swept their 3-, 5-, and 10-year performance periods. Those funds are the Fidelity Series International Value Fund (FINVX), Fidelity Managed Retirement 2025 Fund (FIXRX) and Fidelity Intermediate Government Income Fund (FSTGX).

This marks the third year in a row that FSTGX has swept all three time periods.

Two other funds riding 3-year streaks of sweeping all three time periods are the Pimco GNMA & Government Securities Fund (PDMIX) and Pimco Long-Term US Government Fund (PGOVX).

Invesco has three funds that have swept their respective category time periods over each of the past four years: the Invesco AMT-Free Municipal Fund (OMFCX), Invesco Pennsylvania Municipal Fund (OPACX), and Invesco Rochester New York Municipals Fund (RMUCX).

Bart Grenier, head of asset management at Fidelity, put the fund company’s performance in long-term perspective.

“Market volatility is an inherent part of investing,” Grenier said. “While having well-established processes in place to deal with this is critical, what’s even more important is having experienced, dedicated investment professionals sifting through the noise to make decisions focused on the long term and always with the best interests of our fund shareholders in mind. Delivering strong, consistent long-term performance for our fund shareholders is core to what we do, and we’re honored our portfolio managers have been recognized by Lipper for their hard work and commitment to our clients.”

This year’s overall small-company winner is Calamos Advisors, which didn’t win any individual fund awards for the three-year period used to measure of fund family’s overall risk-adjusted performance.

According to Tom Roseen, head of research services at Refinitiv Lipper, this year’s line separating small and large fund companies was $131.2 billion in total assets.

At the large-company level, the overall fund family must have at least five unique funds in the equity and fixed-income categories, and at least three in the mixed assets category. Small fund companies are required to have at least three unique funds in each of the three categories.

On Calamos not winning any individual fund awards for the three-year period but still winning the overall small-company award, Roseen said, “That shows they didn’t hit a home run, but they had lots of funds hitting triples.”

“That happens more frequently than you’d think,” he added.

John Koudounis, chief executive at Calamos, which manages $44 billion, said the overall company award reflects Calamos’ diverse set of strengths.

“Being named best overall small fund company demonstrates our investment teams’ breadth and depth of experience as active risk managers, having delivered significant risk-adjusted outperformance across multiple strategies during a volatile period,” Koudounis said.

Beyond the overall company winners, JP Morgan Investment Management was the large-company winner in the equity category, and Needham Investment Management was the small-company winner in the equity category.

On the fixed-income side, Nuveen was the large-company winner, and Carillon Tower Advisers was the small-company winner, marking the second consecutive year it won the category.

“We are very excited and proud that Lipper has recognized Carillon’s fixed-income funds for the second year in a row,” said Bob Kendall, president of Carillon Tower Advisers, a subsidiary of Raymond James Financial.

“The award acknowledges the good work that Reams Asset Management, our affiliate investment partner that runs the Carillon fixed-income funds, has done in a very challenging environment,” Kendall said.

Nuveen, which has half its $1.2 trillion under management in fixed-income portfolios, won the same award two years ago, but what makes this year’s award unique is that it represents the consolidation of multiple asset managers.

“We were a multi-boutique company, but over the last three years we’ve brought together TIAA, Nuveen and multiple affiliates into one large fixed-income asset manager,” said Bill Huffman, Nuveen’s head of fixed income and equities.

“The key thing has been, we brought this organization together from a scale perspective,” he added.

In the mixed assets category, Lord Abbett & Co. was the winner among large companies, and Virtus Investment Advisers won the small-company award.