The Vanguard Group has announced a pair of product moves. The Valley Forge, Pennsylvania based form is shaking up the portfolio management structure in its $4.3 billion Equity Income Fund (VEIPX) by pulling a subadvisor; it is also taking the wraps off a new dividend focused fund that will carry VIPER shares.

The loser in the portfolio management move is John A. Levin & Company, which is losing a mandate to manage $800 million of fund assets. The pool of money, which represents some 18 percent of the fund, will be taken over by long time Vanguard partner Wellington Management Company.

Wellington, one of the fund's three existing subadvisors, will be responsible for managing $2.6 billion of the fund's assets following the shift. Vanguard itself will manage the remaining $1.7 billion for the fund.

Vanguard officials said the fund's directors focused on style consistency and the investment process, absolute and relative long-term performance, and the depth and composition of the management and research teams among other issues when considering the change.

"The Board concluded that adopting a co-manager structure -– blending Wellington’s fundamental approach with Vanguard’s quantitative strategies -– would best serve the fund going forward," explained Jack Brennan, Vanguard's chairman and CEO.

He added that the fund's expense ratio should fall slightly because of the change.

Vanguard officials also took the wraps of the newest member of the fund family, the Dividend Acheivers Index Fund. The fund is now in registration with the SEC and will offer both traditional shares and a class of VIPER ETF shares. The Vanguard Quantitative Equity Group will manage the portfolio.

Gus Sauter, Vanguard's chief investment officer, said that the new fund is the firm's fiftieth fund and twenty-fourth VIPER. Vanguard’s Amex-listed ETF family will include ten VIPERs tracking broad domestic stock markets, eleven targeting specific domestic stock sectors, and three tracking broad international stock markets.  

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