Strong competition is expected for a tender that has been advertised by the courts services, seeking a fund manager, managers or consortiums to manage €760 million held by the service.

At present the money is held mainly in deposit accounts by the service on behalf of 22,000 minors and wards of court. The low-risk, relatively low-return accounts have been generating a return of about 4 per cent per annum.

Now the service has published tender notices seeking fund managers to manage four investment portfolios, each on a unitised basis.

It is the intention that the portfolios will include equities, property, bonds and cash (subject to each product's availability) and that the chosen manager, managers or consortiums will provide four unitised funds each with a pre-determined mix of these asset types.

The equities and bonds are to be managed on a passive basis and the property and cash assets are to be run on an active basis, according to the advertisements.

Earlier this year the courts service appointed an investment committee to advise it and this has led to the tender.

Fund managers are expected to compete strongly for a slice of the court funds in what is a highly competitive funds management market.

The funds to be managed do not include pension assets of the courts service staff.