Hargreaves Lansdown has removed the Royal London UK Smaller Companies fund from its Wealth Shortlist following a change of management at the fund.

Royal London informed the investment platform provider that Henry Lowson and Henry Burrell were no longer managing the fund and had left the business, with its head of UK equities, Richard Marwood, taking over the fund’s management.

Hargreaves Lansdown said its conviction in the fund was based on Lowson and Burrell’s continued involvement.

Furthermore, a large part of the fund is owned internally, primarily by pension funds that Royal London manages.

Royal London has confirmed plans to sell these assets over the coming months, and once this process was completed, the fund would either be closed or the remaining investments would be merged into a different fund.

Hargreaves Lansdown added that the news the fund would either be closed or merged in the coming months contributed to its decision to remove the fund from its Wealth Shortlist.

The firm noted that investors would be informed of further details once Royal London has confirmed its future intentions for the fund, and it was expected that monies would be returned to investors if the fund was closed.

If the fund was merged with another, Hargreaves Lansdown believed the investment process and philosophy would be different to how Lowson and Burrell managed the fund.

Meanwhile, Hargreaves Lansdown has added the Vanguard Global Small-Cap Index fund to its Wealth Shortlist.

The fund was chosen by the firm’s analysts as they believed it has long-term performance potential.

They also felt the index tracker fund would provide some diversification to an investment portfolio focused on shares in larger companies.

Hargreaves Lansdown recently announced changes to its fund structure, reducing its platform fee from 0.45 per cent to 0.35 per cent and its share trading fee from £11.95 to £6.95 per trade.

However, it also introduced a fund dealing fee of £1.95 per trade and an increase in the annual cap on certain share charges, with competitors reporting an increase in Hargreaves Lansdown investors moving to other platform providers.

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