Matthews International Capital Management’s Parent rating drops to Below Average from Average, owing to yet more personnel changes, a deep slide in assets under management, and other issues.
The firm has suffered from extreme personnel turnover throughout the 2020s, and it has lost 15 members of its investment team during the past two years, including a former CIO/portfolio manager and other key individuals. The firm has hired Sean Taylor as a CIO/portfolio manager and added another portfolio manager in the past two years. There are now 18 individuals—excluding portfolio strategists and traders—on the investment team. That’s a reasonable number for a firm that focuses on Asia and diversified emerging-markets equity strategies. But there were 31 individuals on the investment team in mid-2023 and more than 40 in 2020. Moreover, Cooper Abbott left the firm in April 2025, less than three years after joining the firm as CEO.
Matthews has replaced Abbott with a familiar face. Mark Headley, who had ample success in various portfolio-manager and leadership roles while working at the firm from 1995 through 2012, has rejoined Matthews as executive chairman and assumed CEO responsibilities. New CIO Sean Taylor also has a good resume for the task at hand.
But Headley, Taylor, and their colleagues have daunting challenges to address. Most of the firm’s strategies have posted mixed, or worse, returns in recent years, and investors have pulled assets away. And with just USD 6 billion of AUM in April 2025, the firm is only around half the size it was in mid-2023 and one fifth the size it was at its peak in the late 2010s.
Note: This share class' Parent Pillar rating is analyst-driven, as its Branding Name, Matthews Asia (Branding Name ID: BN00000C94), is covered by Morningstar Manager Research.
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