Fund supermarkets are a
relatively new concept in the UK, although they’ve been established for some
years now in the US. As the name suggests, a fund supermarket is an outlet that
lets you buy (and sell) a wide range of funds at low cost and aims to cater for
your entire fund needs under one roof. ignificantly reduce your paperwork because you will only receive correspondence from the fund supermarket and not each individual fund manager.
A fund supermarket provides access to many fund managers,
in the case of Fundsdirect you can buy and sell funds from over 100 fund managers in
one simple transaction. To allow us to offer all these services we will register
you within our nominee account.
A nominee account is an account we open on your behalf within which we hold your
investments. It offers you a simple, secure and efficient way of managing your portfolio.
When you instruct us to purchase an investment, rather than the shares or units being
purchased in your own name, they are bought on your behalf by the
fundsdirect nominee company in aggregated trade.
This method of holding investments offers you many advantages,
and unlike most investment companies, we make no charge for this service.
Because we hold the investments on your behalf within our nominee, you can buy or sell
investments at any time without the need to sign documentation.
All you need do to buy or sell investments is complete the on-line instructions -
nothing could be simpler.
Moreover as we can aggregate your dealing instructions with those of other investors,
your deals can be placed faster and discounts are greater than could otherwise be offered.
We will collect any dividends paid from your investments and credit them to the cash balance
on your account. This balance can be paid direct to your bank or building society each quarter
as a regular income, or you can instruct us, when it reaches £1,000, to invest the balance
into new funds.
As we hold your investments on your behalf, this also means that when you view your
portfolio on-line you know it's accurate. If you held investments in your own name
we would have no means of monitoring any change in unit holdings, perhaps as a result
of reinvested dividends or other restructuring.
Your nominee account also means that all correspondence in respect of your investments
comes from just one source - us - greatly reducing your paperwork. We will advise you as
to any events upon which you are required to make any decisions - we'll even filter out any
junk mail from your correspondence.
You remain the owner of the investments at all times, and you may transfer any or
all of your funds within the nominee into your own name or that of another nominee
at any time. There is a charge for this service which is detailed in our terms
and conditions.
In order to operate our nominee account process,
it's necessary to provide you with a cash account facility.
When selling a fund, the proceeds will be paid to your cash account,
allowing you to purchase another fund(s) or withdraw the cash to your
bank or building society account as you wish.
When selling a fund, there will be a delay between your sale instruction and
the proceeds being paid to us by the fund manager. Please bear in mind that you will
be unable to access the cash until we receive the payment from the fund manager,
the payment is normally made within 10 working days from the date of sale.
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