FIS Group

FIS Group is a Philadelphia based asset management and investment advisory firm specializing in emerging manager portfolio construction, risk management and the development of specialized alternative investment strategies.

History

The FIS Group, Inc. entities founded in 1996 by Tina Byles Williams, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Investment Officer, offer emerging manager services to institutional investors. FIS Group, Inc., is the successor registrant under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940 to its wholly-owned subsidiaries, Fiduciary Investment Solutions, Inc. ("FIS") and FIS Funds Management, Inc. ("FISFM"), each of which was first registered as an investment advisor on March 4, 1996. FIS Group, Inc. was formed at the beginning of 2005, at which time "FIS Group" transitioned from the "doing business as" nomenclature for FIS and FISFM to the parent entity for each such company.

Ms. Byles Williams has been involved in structuring emerging manager programs since the early 1980's. Her early work with emerging managers includes her service as an investment officer at A Plan sponsor in addition to an investment advisory firm. At its inception in 1996, FIS provided investment advisory services on an emerging manager program for a large institutional investor for which it had less than full discretion to hire and terminate managers. In 1999, the firm began managing fully discretionary manager of emerging managers accounts.

Today, in addition to providing asset management and investment advisory services to several distinguished institutional clients, FIS Group has diversified its product offering by adding an environmental strategy, which invests in the emissions, water, and clean technology markets. The firm and Greater Philadelphia Venture Capital Corporation have partnered to offer a mezzanine debt strategy, which will provide capital to Small Business Investment Corporations licensed by the SBA.

Mission

"Born out of the vision of Chief Executive Office and Chief Investment Officer, Tina Byles Williams, FIS Group’s mission is to provide innovative and effective solutions for enhancing the wealth of our clients, implemented by highly motivated and skilled investment professionals; to exemplify high ethical standards and excellence in all that we endeavor; and to improve our communities."

Investment Philosophy

FIS Group believes that out sized returns are typically generated by identifying and skillfully negotiating often obscure market inefficiencies. FIS Group's extensive research on both the risks and opportunities presented by emerging strategies and managers enables clients to earn attractive risk-adjusted returns through cost-efficient fund structures. Achieving this goal requires:

• Thorough fundamental research of innovative investment ideas;
• Developing a clear understanding of how value is created;
• Assessing the risks and weighing mitigation options;
• Structuring investments that generate alpha, and;
• Communicating openly and honestly with clients in a timely manner.

By continuing in this tradition and continually holding itself to a high ethical standard, FIS Group can achieve desired result for its partners, namely the clients it serves.

Products and Services

FIS Group currently offers a suite of investment products which includes, manager of emerging managers equity and fixed income portfolios, an environmentally themed investment strategy and a mezzanine private equity strategy.

Environmental Strategies

As environmental markets continue to mature, it is generally recognized that market mechanisms and private investment are important parts of the solution for addressing the growing challenges of water scarcity, resource depletion and global warming. FIS Group believes that this very scarcity of environmental resources, as well as the growing development of market mechanisms and inefficiencies within the environmental markets, provides an opportunity to generate attractive long-term returns. Additionally, since the return drivers of environmental markets are only loosely related to the performance of the global stock and bond markets, environmental investment strategies provide much lower correlation to conventional stock and bond portfolios than most other alternative asset classes.

External links

• FIS Group (company website)
• Watchdog Political Spending