Fortis Investment Management believes in portfolio management tailored to your needs. As a client, you will receive a portfolio we believe is appropriate to help reach your investment goals, managed with an investment practice deeply rooted in our own time-tested processes and philosophies. Our portfolio management approach—combined with our proactive, personalized client service—has allowed us to manage portfolios for more than 40 years. We currently serve over 130,000* clients globally.
Our Investment Policy Committee (IPC) has over 150 years of combined industry experience. Supported by our large Research Department, the IPC monitors global economic and market conditions and makes strategic investment decisions for client portfolios. Our approach is based in active, flexible portfolio management. Scroll down to learn more about our investment approach and how we tailor client portfolios.
Investment success is personal—the management of your assets should be too. Your portfolio deserves more than a cookie-cutter financial plan. Discover how we build investment portfolios tailored to each client’s situation and financial goals, and learn how we can do the same for you.
We believe approximately 70% of long-term portfolio returns are attributable to asset allocation—i.e., what mix of stocks, bonds, cash or other securities you own at any particular time. At the highest level, we gather a wide range of data inputs, aiding both qualitative and quantitative applications of our proprietary capital markets technology. Analysis of current market conditions, history and behavioral factors helps enable our dynamic tactical asset allocation decisions.
We begin by getting a thorough understanding of your personal situation, goals and needs. We use this information in our top-down investment process to determine the mix of stocks, bonds, cash or other securities that we believe will maximize the likelihood of reaching your financial goals.
From there, we emphasize parts of the market we believe will perform best, such as different countries and stock market sectors. Finally, we analyze individual securities and select the ones we believe best capture our high-level views. We believe this flexible, active approach to portfolio management enables us to capitalize on global investing opportunities and help you achieve your financial goals.
Highly skilled trading and implementation teams put our strategy to work in your accounts
You and your Investment Counselor regularly discuss your portfolio and your ongoing needs.
The most important feature of our service model is the education and counseling that we provide to our clients. Our goal is to help our clients achieve their long-term financial goals.
Personalized
As you give us more information about your personal portfolio considerations, we will recommend an initial strategic asset allocation based on your specific objectives. We will review this asset allocation with you in detail before proceeding to build your portfolio.
Disciplined
We use a time-tested investment approach that informs the mix of stocks, bonds and other securities to hold in your portfolio. First, we analyze the global macroeconomic environment and market conditions to identify what we believe are the most attractive investment categories. Then, we select individual securities within those categories that fit your tailored investment strategy.
Flexible
We believe our approach helps enhance returns and reduce risk by making forecasts and changing asset allocations accordingly. This tactical approach is different from the style of investing in many mutual funds or from money managers who tend to adhere to a static allocation of stocks and bonds and are unwilling or unable to make changes based on market conditions.
Global
Many investors focus only their home country’s stocks. Investment opportunities, however, abound in our increasingly connected global economy. We seek diversification and potential returns by investing across global equity markets.
Our investing style emphasizes an active, flexible approach. While passive portfolio management rightly has its supporters, we believe if passive investing was always as easy as it sounds, then everybody would be doing it effectively.
Yet, being a true passive investor requires extreme discipline that many people often struggle to attain. Investors frequently react emotionally to uncertainty, whether through market volatility or economic, political or personal challenges.
Studies have found that people feel the negative impacts of a loss twice as much as the positive impacts of a gain. This often means that even relatively modest volatility or downturns can lead to investor panic and overreactions to short-term changes by pulling money out of the market and failing to re-enter before it recovers.
Emotion is the downfall of effective passive investment retirement strategies. As soon as you let your feelings drive you into action, you’re no longer a passive investor. Almost inevitably, this subjective bias influences investment decisions, particularly during times of market peaks or troughs.
On the other hand, a good active investment manager has the experience and analytical resources needed to help investors avoid investing pitfalls. An active manager like Fortis Investment Management has a wealth of research and analytical resources to better ensure that your portfolio is positioned to help you meet your financial goals.
What many investors need is an asset allocation aligned with their long-term goals. As we’ve discussed, having the discipline to endure the ups and downs of a passive approach is something many struggle with, so it’s also valuable to consider how your investment adviser may help prevent you from making a costly error in judgement.
The key with either active or passive investment is to stay disciplined and follow your plan. The difference is that with an active manager, you have someone knowledgeable there to help you steer a steady course when emotions and uncertainty arise.
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Which direction is the market headed?
The Stock Market Outlook looks at key stock market drivers and can be useful whether you manage your own investments or work with an investment professional.
