The Australian sourced investment management market climbed 1.9% during the December 2011 quarter to $1.370 trillion, Rainmaker has revealed in its latest Roundup report.

Annual growth was negative 1.6%, resulting in FUM still being below the pre-GFC peak of $1.5 trillion it reached December 2007, they noted.

The five fastest growing asset classes over the 12 months were private equity which increased 28%, Infrastructure (up 18%), hedge funds (up 17%), Australian fixed (up 12%) and active extension (up 11%).

The five slowest growing asset classes over the year were ethical/SRI which contracted 29%, "other" assets not including PE, hedge funds and private equity (down 14%), listed property and Australian equities (both down 10%) and international equities (down 9%).

Shifting the focus to distribution segments, Rainmaker noted that the fastest growing we were small super funds which climbed 2.2%, not-for-profit super (up 1.9%), specialist investment managers (up 1.8%), retail FUM (up 1.5%) and overall superannuation (1.2%).

Indexing meanwhile was down 7.3% through the year to $211 billion, down to the equivalent of 15.4% of the broad market which is its lowest penetration level in eight quarters despite the growth in Exchange Traded Funds.

The largest investment managers in Australia are AMP Capital Investors with $100 billion, Colonial First State Global Asset Management and the FFMA both with $90 billion, State Street Global Advisors (SSGA) with $75 billion and MLC Investment Management with $71 billion. The top five managers continue to control 31% of the market, the top 10 control 49%.

The fastest growing managers, in percentage terms, are Omega Global Investors (up 310%), Ardea (up 284%), LaSalle (up 169%), Mutual Limited (up 135%) and Palisade (up 118%). The fast growing in dollar terms are Tyndall, Challenger, SSGA, IFM and State Street Global Markets (SSGM).