If you love Dividend Growth (VDIGX), you should consider the recently launched International Dividend Growth (VIDGX) for your foreign stock exposure.
Given Dividend Growth’s (VDIGX) success over the past two decades, this international stock fund has been a long time coming.
Wellington’s Peter Fisher, who is taking over the reins at Dividend Growth from Don Kilbride at the end of the year, runs this active fund. He’s worked alongside Kilbride for years, and while Fisher will run the show, Kilbride will remain a resource for some time. At International Dividend Growth, Fisher will be using the battle-tested approach that served Kilbride and him so well at Dividend Growth; the only difference is that he’ll be applying it to foreign markets.
As with Dividend Growth, the goal at International Dividend Growth is to compound wealth in a risk-aware manner by building a portfolio that will produce a steady, growing stream of dividends.
Fisher’s mandate is to buy stock in companies where management has both the ability and the willingness not only to pay dividends but also to increase those payouts over time. It’s not about buying the highest-yielding stocks but finding companies that will grow their dividends.
You can hear (or read) Fisher and Kilbride discuss their approach to stock-picking in my exclusive interview with the two managers here.
Fisher has run an international dividend growth strategy for Wellington’s institutional clients since 2019. In this article, I’ll dig into his track record to help inform my opinion of the new fund. But before talking about performance, let’s cover the basics.
The fund launched at the beginning of November with a two-week subscription period. This means the fund will initially hold cash as Vanguard tries to raise money. Then, beginning November 15, Fisher will start buying stocks and building the investment portfolio.