NEW YORK
GuideStone Funds® was awarded the Lipper Fund Award from Refinitiv — formerly presented by Thomson Reuters — as the Best Overall Small Fund Family for 2019 on Thursday, March 7. The entire GuideStone Funds family won the Lipper Fund Award for 2019 Best Overall Small Company over three years (out of 29 eligible as of November 30, 2018). Based on risk-adjusted total return. Of the 222 small fund families, only 29 met the standards to be considered for the Best Overall Small Fund Family prestigious award — with up to 76.8 billion in assets under management. This marks the second time in less than a decade that GuideStone® was honored with this top award.
During a dinner Thursday night in New York, several members of the GuideStone leadership team, including chief strategic investment officer David S. Spika and GuideStone Funds chief investment officer Matt Peden, were on hand to accept this honor on GuideStone’s behalf.
“It is a tremendous honor to be recognized by the peers in our industry for this prestigious accolade: Performance plus values wins again,” GuideStone chief operating officer John R. Jones said. “We give thanks to the Lord, first and foremost, for His leadership of this ministry and then thanks to the hard-working employees at GuideStone and the managers we have assembled to invest on behalf of our participants.”
GuideStone president O.S. Hawkins echoed those sentiments.
“What this truly comes down to for us is the matter of stewardship,” Hawkins said. “As a ministry organization, GuideStone believes every good and perfect gift comes from the Lord Himself. As the parable of the talents clearly communicates, we are called to be stewards — managers — of the resources with which we’re entrusted.
“This Lipper Fund Award helps demonstrate — in the accounting we are called to give — that our team is following a proven process that benefits pastors, missionaries, hospital employees and college and university faculty, plus thousands of individual investors.”
Spika, a frequent guest on CNBC and Fox Business, said the award speaks to the professional respect that GuideStone has assembled over its relatively short history as a fund family — the GuideStone Funds complex was first launched as a registered mutual fund company on August 27, 2001.
“We founded our mutual fund family in 2001 on the belief that we could achieve competitive investor outcomes while at the same time aligning our portfolios with Christian principles. This recognition highlights our belief that investors can invest according to their values without sacrificing performance,” states David Spika, president of Guidestone Capital Management®.
For more than three decades, the Lipper Fund Awards have evaluated mutual funds and fund management firms that have provided consistently strong risk-adjusted performance relative to their peers. Their methodology reviews fund performance based on three-, five- and 10-year periods. The award program is regarded as one of the most prestigious in the financial services industry.
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Investing involves risk, including the potential loss of principal. The Funds may experience negative performance, and past performance does not guarantee future results.
The Lipper Awards for Best Overall Small Fund Family are based on a review of 29 fund families for 2019 and based on risk-adjusted performance for the three-year period ending November 30, 2018. Award for U.S. Region Only.
The Refinitiv Lipper Fund Awards are based on Overall/Small fund family groups and will need to have at least three distinct portfolios in one of the asset classes — equity, bond or mixed asset. The lowest average decile rank of the three years’ Consistent Return measure of the eligible funds per asset class and group will determine the asset class Group Award winner over the three-year period. The Lipper Leader for Consistent Return rating, which is a risk-adjusted performance measure, is calculated over 36, 60 and 120 months. The fund with the highest Lipper Leader for Consistent Return (Effective Return) value in each eligible classification wins the Lipper Fund Award. The Lipper Fund Awards, granted annually, highlight funds and fund companies that have excelled in delivering consistently strong risk-adjusted performance relative to their peers. Additional information is available at LipperFundAwards.com.
Our first recognition as the Best Overall Small Fund Family came in 2012 for the Best Overall Small Company Award (out of 26 eligible fund families as of November 30, 2011). Of the 182 small fund families, only 26 met the standards to be considered for the Best Overall Small Fund Family with up to $40 billion in assets under management. At that time, fund groups with at least three equity, three bond and three mixed-asset classes were eligible for a Group Award, with the lowest average decile rank of the three years’ Consistent Return measure of the eligible funds per asset class and group determining the award winner over the three-year period ended November 30, 2011. In case of identical results, the lower average percentile rank was determined the winner.
Group Methodology: For the 2019 Refinitiv Lipper Fund Awards (based on three-year period ending November 30, 2018), a small fund family is defined as having assets of $76.8 billion or less.
From Refinitiv Lipper Awards, ©2019 Refinitiv. All rights reserved. Used by permission and protected by the Copyright Laws of the United States. The printing, copying, redistribution or retransmission of this content without express written permission is prohibited.
While GuideStone manages $16 billion in assets, as of December 31, 2018, GuideStone Funds has $12.1 billion in assets, which makes GuideStone Funds the nation’s largest faith-based mutual fund family. No other fund family with a Christian screen exceeds GuideStone Funds in asset size.
You should carefully consider the investment objectives, risks, charges and expenses of the GuideStone Funds before investing. A prospectus with this and other information about the Funds may be obtained by calling 1-888-GS-FUNDS (1-888-473-8637) or downloading one. It should be read carefully before investing.
GuideStone Funds shares are distributed by Foreside Funds Distributors LLC, not an advisor affiliate. Foreside is not a registered investment adviser and does not provide investment advice.
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Roy Hayhurst is director of denominational and public relations at GuideStone.
Media Contact
Roy Hayhurst
Director of Denominational and Public Relations Services
GuideStone Financial Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention
Roy.Hayhurst@GuideStone.org | (214) 720-2141
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