June 08, 2026

The Award-Winning Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund: 16 Years of Rich, Quality “Vanilla” Tastes Better Than Ever

We have been fielding numerous calls from advisors and prospective private clients looking for an alternative to the alternatives (hedge funds, private real estate, credit, and equity funds) they’d been sold on. The original promise of “higher returns and lower volatility” has in many cases missed clients’ return expectations (especially in some real estate funds) and has been coupled with the added insult of capital lock-ups and distribution cuts. It seems the invoice for illiquidity risk – the cost for accessing these seeming unicorns – has come due for some of these investors and they’re now looking for another way. 

In “Private Credit’s Rude Awakening Gives Bond Funds a New Edge,” Bloomberg wrote this Spring about the rising backlash against complexity, writing “Money managers at PIMCO, Janus Henderson Group and Baird Asset Management say retail clients have been receptive to their simple pitch on the merits of bond funds: solid yields, asset-price transparency and no restrictions on pulling money out. For investors worried about getting back the cash they have tied up in slumping private-credit funds, the message has new-found appeal.”

These conversations have given us the opportunity to talk about something we’ve perhaps been a little too “Quiet Money” on over the years. We’ve actually been quietly managing a solid alternative to private asset funds since 2010 – the Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund. As we illustrate below, it ranks solid first quartile over all periods through 10 years within its balanced universe, and has even topped the average Canadian private debt and private equity funds over that period – with daily liquidity. 

Fundata also recently awarded our Income Advantage (and Corporate Advantage) Funds with its highest “A+” rating – for risk-adjusted performance over the last 10 years¹. These also aren’t the first awards the funds have received.

More than Vanilla

With deep institutional roots (representing over 85% of our $36 billion under management today), we’ve built our business over the last 44 years by “winning by not losing”: protect capital, do our homework to build resilient, growing portfolios that avoid fads, and focus on the long term. We had zero exposure to Nortel through the entire tech bubble. We wrote articles critical of cannabis (2018) and NFT (2022) speculation. And while we don’t try to market-time, our disciplined / contrarian approach prompted us to buy $750 million of equities in balanced strategies within a day of the COVID market bottom. 

We describe Leith Wheeler’s style as “quality vanilla”: our investment teams only use derivatives to hedge risk (like currency exposure), we reel in our credit exposure when we’re not getting adequately compensated to own it, and we offer illiquid strategies to select clients – but counsel them against over-allocating to it. At the same time, despite taking lower risk, through thoughtful analysis and security selection we’ve been able to deliver comparable or even better returns relative to industry averages. 

We manage low complexity, easy-to-explain strategies that have consistently delivered for our clients. The question disillusioned investors and advisors should ask, then, is: if you could earn the same or better returns for less risk from a liquid fund, why wouldn’t you?

Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund

In launching the Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund in 2010, we set out to capture this strategy – with the added benefit of managing for tax efficiency. Figure 1 breaks down the components of the Fund.

Figure 1: The Recipe for the Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund

Early results confirmed that we were on to something. We were delivering higher yields than government bonds, providing solid upside/downside performance versus balanced portfolios, and doing it all with lower volatility. Throw in that the Fund invests to provide a tax-efficient source of income, and the case was clear. 

While the ingredients were important, anyone who’s stared at a deflated soufflé quickly appreciates the difference between having the recipe and having the experience to make it delicious.

In reflecting on the fund’s launch 16 years ago (it was later offered in F series in 2015), Leith Wheeler’s President, CEO & Head of Fixed Income, Jim Gilliland, said, “We have a deeply experienced team who have worked on big, sophisticated bond desks, but didn’t feel we needed to build a complex product to deliver on the fund objectives – which were to create a high quality product, with lower risk, tax awareness, and fair fees.” 

As a firm that had been managing institutional clients since 1982, the skill set was there; we just needed to adapt it for a taxable, individual client base. While we keep things simple in our portfolios, the team has deep experience managing more complex strategies. See the Appendix for some examples of the depth of experience from the broader team. 

Has the hypothesis held up? In a word: Yes!

As Figures 2abc and 3 show, the strategy has continued to deliver – not only in absolute terms, but also relative to other balanced funds and to private fund alternatives. Of note:

• 2a: The Fund’s net-of-fee returns exceeded the universe average by 2.0% per year for the last 10 years (6.5% vs 4.5% p.a.), meaning $100,000 would have grown to $196k in the Fund, vs $161k in the universe average 
• 2b: The Fund is firmly in 1st quartile ranking over 1, 3, 5, and 10 years 
• 2c: Over the past 3 years, the Fund generated returns well above the universe (10.7% vs 7.5%) while incurring lower levels of volatility (standard deviation). That translated to 2.8% of post-fee alpha while simultaneously incurring less risk than the peer median. 
• 3: Over the past 10 years, the Fund has generated higher returns than private debt and private equity funds (estimated averages by Fundata) 

Figure 2: Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund - Series F vs Canadian Balanced - Fixed Income Focus Peers (“Benchmark”) (Source: Fundata)

2a: Growth of $10,000 | From September 2015 Inception to April 30, 2026

2b: Returns through April 30, 2026

2c: Risk & Return: 3 years ended April 30, 2026

 

Figure 3: Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund – Series F vs Canadian Private Asset Funds*, 10 Years to April 30, 2026

Making advisors’ lives easier: Clear reporting + KYP and due diligence support

When analytics and transparency are in your DNA, good things can happen. For our F-series and SMA clients, it means clear reporting and regular (but not annoying) updates. Given the Income Advantage Fund invests in publicly traded securities, there’s none of the opacity that can plague private funds. It’s a clear, easy-to-understand (and explain!) strategy, with T+1 liquidity – that has delivered comparable to better returns than alternatives.

How to access the Fundata FundGrade A+ funds: Leith Wheeler Income Advantage Fund (LWF030) and Corporate Advantage Fund (LWF032)

Our Funds are available in F Series for fee-based advisors, select family offices, and investment counsel firms. Click the link below or hit us up on our Let’s Talk form. We’ll be happy to get you and your clients set up for success. 
 

 

Appendix: Select team members managing the Income Advantage Fund

• Jim Gilliland, CFA | President, CEO & Head of Fixed Income – An alumnus of MK Wong/HSBC, and Barclays (San Francisco) where he built what has now become one of BlackRock’s largest high yield hedge funds; developed risk management platforms; and created customized client and liability-driven solutions.
• Dhruv Mallick, CFA | Head of Credit – An alumnus of CQS, a London-based multi-sector alternative credit platform (now owned by Manulife), Barclays/BlackRock (San Francisco), and PIMCO.
• Nick Szucs, CFA | Head of Canadian Equities – An alumnus of London-based global hedge fund managers, Brevan Howard Asset Management, and Sofaer Capital, which was started by George Soros.

 

1 FundGrade A+® is used with permission from Fundata Canada Inc., all rights reserved. The annual FundGrade A+® Awards are presented by Fundata Canada Inc. to recognize the “best of the best” among Canadian investment funds. The FundGrade A+® calculation is supplemental to the monthly FundGrade ratings and is calculated at the end of each calendar year. The FundGrade rating system evaluates funds based on their risk-adjusted performance, measured by Sharpe Ratio, Sortino Ratio, and Information Ratio. The score for each ratio is calculated individually, covering all time periods from 2 to 10 years. The scores are then weighted equally in calculating a monthly FundGrade. The top 10% of funds earn an A Grade; the next 20% of funds earn a B Grade; the next 40% of funds earn a C Grade; the next 20% of funds receive a D Grade; and the lowest 10% of funds receive an E Grade. To be eligible, a fund must have received a FundGrade rating every month in the previous year. The FundGrade A+® uses a GPA-style calculation, where each monthly FundGrade from “A” to “E” receives a score from 4 to 0, respectively. A fund’s average score for the year determines its GPA. Any fund with a GPA of 3.5 or greater is awarded a FundGrade A+® Award. For more information, see www.FundGradeAwards.com Although Fundata makes every effort to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the data contained herein, the accuracy is not guaranteed by Fundata.
 

 

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