Pinnacle Investment Management Group Ltd (ASX: PNI) released its FY19 results this morning showing a big increase in funds under management (FUM). Here’s what you need to know.
About Pinnacle
Pinnacle Investment Management is a “multi-affiliate investment management firm” that operates slightly differently to your typical fund manager.
Pinnacle holds ownership interests in specialist investment managers and partners with them to provide governance, working capital, seed funding and marketing/distribution and support services. This allows the investment managers to operate autonomously while receiving any needed support to grow their business.
Pinnacle currently consists of 13 investment affiliates that collectively manage $54.3 billion in assets. The more FUM and fees the investment affiliates collect the more money Pinnacle makes.
The 4 Key Points
- Net profit after tax (NPAT) from continuing operations increased 32% to $30.5 million
- Basic earnings per share (EPS) from continuing operations was up 28% to 18.3 cents per share
- Fully franked dividend of 9.3 cents per share, up 32.8%
- Funds under management (FUM) increased by 42.9% to $54.3 billion
Funds Under Management
Funds under management was one of Pinnacle’s best results, increasing by $16.3 billion in FY19. This figure is broken down into $6.8 billion of “acquired” FUM, $6.5 billion in net fund inflows and $3 billion from investment performance.
Over the last 10 years, FUM has grown at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 28.5% per year.
Management Commentary
Pinnacle’s Chair, Alan Watson, highlighted the dividend growth as one of the standout figures.
“In FY19 shareholders will benefit from 15.4c of fully franked ordinary dividends per share, compared to 3.3c of fully franked ordinary dividends per share in FY16,” he said.
Pinnacle’s Managing Director, Ian Macoun, said the company’s focus is still on assisting affiliates to grow their businesses.
“Pinnacle’s focus remained on continuing to support each of our Affiliates and assisting them to grow their business and profitability, as well as expanding our distribution and infrastructure capabilities to support future growth,” he said.
Is Pinnacle A Buy?
Looking at the results, it’s clear that Pinnacle has benefited from a large increase in FUM and profits/fees have been increasing along with the strong share market.
Personally, though, I tend to avoid this type of business because in a downturn it can suffer a sharp reduction in FUM, which can very quickly hurt the company’s profit. Usually, it’s a situation that is out of the company’s control.
That’s why I’d rather invest in one of the businesses mentioned in the free report below.
[ls_content_block id=”14945″ para=”paragraphs”]
Disclosure: At the time of writing, Max does not own shares in any of the companies mentioned.