The pair have been building their track record with an offshore version of the fund for the past 18 months and Jupiter thinks now is the time to bring it onshore.
The fund has an absolute return mandate, but investors will be asked by Geldard and Manzi to "give them time" to do what they promise.
Geldard said three years was the timeframe he was looking for because in two years a manager could get in very right or very wrong by accident.
At a roundtable to introduce the fund, which launched on Tuesday, Geldard was at pains to establish the Strategic Reserve Fund was conservative and in the lower risk section of the absolute return sector.
He said there are no minimum caps on asset classes, but there were maxima, which include a 40% maximum weighting to equities and a maximum duration of five years for bonds.
Rationale
The aim of the fund is to preserve capital in difficult times and its launch was driven by three main factors in the past decade: disappointing equity returns, high and persistent volatility and increasingly expensive "safe havens" such as sovereign bonds.
Geldard explained that even some of the best-known fixed income investors, such as Pimco’s Bill Gross are very concerned about the amount of money that has been flowing into the asset class and the suppressed yields this had led to.
He said this did not mean he would not hold any sovereign bonds within the fund, but that he would keep duration short, a strategy that worked well for him in his previous multi-asset fund during 2008.
Currently, his position on corporate bonds is also not very favourable, although he admits he was perhaps cynical on the asset class prematurely since they did well last year.
Portfolio construction
Instead Geldard likes the look of convertible bonds and conservative equities, which he sees as ideal for absolute return-focused funds.
The target for the fund is cash plus 3% and the volatility of the fund should not exceed 5%.
Geldard and Manzi have worked together since 1998: first for JP Morgan Asset Management (having come from Jardine Fleming and Flemings respectively) and then at RWC Partners.
Geldard was previously head of the global multi asset group and global strategy team at JPM Asset Management, a role he said stands him in good stead for his asset allocation calls on his new fund for Jupiter.
The Luxembourg-domiciled Sicav version of the fund "flatlined" last year, he said, which was due to not cutting all exposure to the yen (a currency he is very bearish on) but it has returned circa 2.5% year-to-date.
