The State of Hawaii Savings Plan will consider dropping the Delaware Investments Trend Fund, a mid-cap growth fund, which has $36 million of the $1.3 billion in plan assets. A state official said the Delaware fund was placed on watch a few months ago because of poor performance. According to data from Morningstar, the Delaware Trend Fund returned -4.16 % year to date, 5.6% last year and 8.30% over the past three years. It trailed the Standard & Poor’s Total Return Index by 6.0% year to date and 1.69%, over three years. Delaware spokeswoman Ayleen Ajavon said the firm cannot comment on the matter.
The official said the fund would not likely be replaced, and if the state does drop the Delaware fund the assets will be mapped over into a newly-added small-cap growth fund unless the participant elects otherwise. She did not want to name the firm that won the mandate for the small-cap fund because the contract is still being negotiated.
The state issued a request for proposals for the small-cap growth fund in November and was still interviewing firms in April (DCSPA, 4/24). Mercer Human Resources Consulting is the plan consultant and CitiStreet is the recordkeeper.