Columbia Seligman Global Technology Fund (and CT (Lux) Global Technology): Manager Diligence (First Pass)

Prepared 2026-10-20 from the files in sources/. This uses the hedge-fund-diligence format, adapted for a daily-dealing '40 Act mutual fund (Class Inst: CSGZX) and its Luxembourg sister fund. Hedge-fund items such as incentive fees, lock-ups, gates and prime brokers do not apply, so this note covers fees, PM ownership, compensation, side-by-side accounts and distribution instead. The newest evidence is the Q3 2026 fact sheet and attribution report (30 Sep 2026) and the July 2026 N-PORT. The qualitative process material is older: the Lux RFP is dated 31 Dec 2024 and the Lux deck 30 Sep 2025. This is a first-pass note, not full investment diligence, not ODD, and not a recommendation.

Source key: [FS26] Fact sheet, Q3 2026 · [Attr26] Gross attribution report vs. MSCI World IT, Q3 2026 · [SP26] Summary prospectus, 1 Mar 2026 (497K) · [Pro26] Statutory prospectus in 485BPOS, filed 26 Feb 2026 · [SAI26] SAI dated 1 Oct 2026 (497, filed 24 Sep 2026) · [AR25] Annual report and financials, FY to 31 Oct 2025 (N-CSR, filed 2 Jan 2026) · [SAR26] Semi-annual report, 6 months to 30 Apr 2026 (N-CSRS, filed 2 Jul 2026) · [NP-Jan26 / NP-Apr26 / NP-Jul26] N-PORT holdings at 31 Jan, 30 Apr and 31 Jul 2026 · [NCEN] N-CEN, filed 9 Jan 2026 · [24F] 24F-2NT, filed 12 Jan 2026 · [RFP24] "CT (Lux) Global Technology" RFP, data as at 31 Dec 2024 (the file is named "2Q25") · [Lux25] CT (Lux) Global Technology deck, Q3 2025

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1. First Impression

What it is. This is a concentrated, non-diversified global technology equity fund. It has been run by Paul Wick since 1994 and co-managed with Vimal Patel since 2018 [SP26]. Net assets were $4.82B across all classes at 30 Sep 2026, in 72 holdings [FS26]. The team calls its style bottom-up GARP: it looks for "undervalued and misunderstood" tech companies and tries to be early to non-consensus ideas [FS26; RFP24 pp.6, 10]. The same Seligman Technology Group, based in Menlo Park and New York, also runs the much larger Columbia Seligman Technology and Information Fund ($14.1B), a Luxembourg SICAV ($1.2B) and Seligman long/short hedge funds. Team AUM was $22.3B at December 2024 [RFP24 p.5; Lux25 p.11].

Why it merits a look. The track record is long and strong. Class Inst returned 26.70% a year over 10 years, against 23.65% for the MSCI World IT Index (Net) and 19.17% for the category. It has Morningstar 5 stars and sits in the 9th to 12th category percentile across all periods [FS26]. The team is unusually tenured. Wick has run the strategy since 1990. Five of the six named team members have been on the fund since 2014 to 2021, and the senior analysts average about 27 years of experience [RFP24 p.4; SP26]. Risk is set by stock picking, not the benchmark: Active Share is 71%, R² is 0.72 and beta is 1.02 [FS26].

What is unclear, and the biggest gaps:

• One stock dominates recent results. Bloom Energy, a fuel-cell company classified under Electrical Equipment, was 12.2% of net assets at Oct 2025 and 13.5% at Apr 2026 [AR25; SAR26]. In the 12 months to Sep 2026 it contributed 17.7 points of the fund's 65.5% gross return [Attr26 p.2]. The team's own stated guideline caps positions at 5%, lets high-conviction names run to 8%, and trims at 7–8% [RFP24 p.9]. Bloom was above 8% in every holdings snapshot from Sep 2025 to Sep 2026 except Jul 2026 (8.0%).
• Portfolio drift against the stated process. The decks describe a mid-cap tilt ($2–30B) and a top 10 of 40–50% [RFP24 p.10; Lux25 p.17]. Actual figures were a $924B weighted-average market cap [FS26] and a 52.8–53.4% top 10 in the first half of 2026 [NP-Jan26; NP-Apr26]. Industrials were 14.7% of the fund at Apr 2026 [SAR26].
• Steady net outflows despite top-decile returns. Excluding reinvested distributions, net redemptions were about $240M in FY2025, $66M in Nov 2025–Apr 2026 and $38M in May–Jul 2026 (see §4). AUM growth from $2.39B to $4.8B came from market gains.
• Conflicts from side-by-side management. Wick also manages $3.4B in pooled vehicles and $2.8B in other accounts. $3.67B of these charge performance fees. The team's bonus pool is partly funded by hedge-fund performance fees, set on absolute returns [SAI26 pp.148, 188].
• Covered-call writing has grown but is not a principal strategy. Written calls on top holdings, including Bloom, rose from a $0.66M average liability in FY2025 to a $38.3M liability at Apr 2026, with $341M of collateral pledged [AR25; SAR26]. The prospectus does not list option writing as a principal strategy [SP26].
• Succession. Wick has 39 years of experience [FS26]. The sources do not set out a succession plan.

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2. Team

The other analysts listed in the 2024–25 decks are Israel Hernandez, Jeetil Patel, Nitin Saigal and Jonathan Wang (software, internet, IT services). The decks also list John Noell and Matt Gmitro, who focus on short positions, which are relevant to the hedge funds rather than this fund. Kosta Kleyman covers biotech and medtech. Van Wilshire, head of derivative strategies, joined in 2024 [RFP24 pp.4, 18–20; Lux25 pp.14–15].

Facts. The roster of 14 investment professionals was the same in Dec 2024 and Sep 2025, and Wilshire (2024) is the only recent senior hire [RFP24 p.4; Lux25 p.15]. The six portfolio-management names on the Q3 2026 fact sheet match the March 2026 prospectus [FS26; SP26]. None of the 2026 supplements reviewed changed portfolio managers for this fund.

Bio inconsistencies to tidy up (stale text, not findings). Patel's career start is given as 2001 [Pro26 p.21], 1996 [RFP24 p.4] and "30 years" [FS26]. Wadhwani is described as having "18 years" of experience although he joined the industry in 1998 [Lux25 p.38]. Jeetil Patel is credited with "17 years" despite joining in 1995. Wick's bio in [Lux25 p.36] says "almost two decades" on the Communications and Information strategy, while [RFP24 p.18] says "over three decades".

Read. The analyst bench is deep and specialised by sub-sector, which supports idea generation. Decision rights, however, rest with Wick [RFP24 p.12]. Concentration in a few high-conviction names makes the portfolio look PM-driven rather than institutionalised. The key-person question is about succession timing, and the Patel–Wick handover structure is not described in any source.

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3. Terms, Liquidity and Alignment (mutual-fund adaptation)

Terms [SP26; FS26].

• Liquidity is daily NAV dealing. There is no performance fee, lock-up or gate. The fund is non-diversified [SP26].
• Management-fee breakpoints step from 0.915% (first $500M) to 0.815$4–6B). The SAI table appears to list the same schedule for this fund and for Seligman Technology and Information [SAI26 p.115]. The FY2025 effective rate was 0.907% [Pro26 p.21]. Fees paid were $23.1M in FY2025, $20.4M in FY2024 and $15.4M in FY2023 [SAI26 p.119].
• The Board's 2025 contract review noted that total expenses were "somewhat higher than the median" of the Broadridge peer group, and that performance "ranked above median" for certain periods [AR25 Approval of Management Agreement].

Alignment.

• PM ownership. Wick is in the top SAI band (over $1M) and Patel holds $100–500K. Three of the six named team members hold no shares [SAI26 p.148]. Given the $4.8B fund size and Wick's tenure, the "over $1M" band hides the actual stake, which should be asked for.
• Compensation. There is a team bonus pool. The share of mutual-fund fees that funds it depends on 1-, 3- and 5-year performance relative to peers. Hedge-fund management fees fund it at a fixed rate, and hedge-fund performance fees by absolute annual return [SAI26 p.188; RFP24 p.5]. The sources do not mention deferral into fund shares.
• Side-by-side accounts. Besides this fund, at 31 Oct 2025 Wick managed 3 other RICs ($20.6B), 3 PIVs ($3.37B) and 335 other accounts ($2.79B). The performance-fee accounts were 2 PIVs ($1.99B) and 2 other accounts ($1.68B) [SAI26 p.148]. The Lux deck calls him "among the longest-tenured tech hedge fund managers in the U.S." [Lux25 p.14]. How trades are allocated across the mutual funds, hedge funds and 335 SMAs, and how the team manages long/short conflicts, is a primary diligence item.
• Distribution concentration. Affiliated shareholders of record held 28.0% of shares at Oct 2025 and 27.8% at Apr 2026 [AR25 Note 9; SAR26]. Ameriprise's American Enterprise Investment Services held 28.09% of the fund at 31 Jan 2026 [SAI26 p.367]. This looks like Ameriprise's brokerage platform rather than seed capital (inferred), but it is still concentrated redemption risk.
• Tax. Unrealised gains were about 60% of net assets at both Oct 2025 and Apr 2026 (cost $1.30B vs. value $3.29B; $1.64B vs. $4.12B) [AR25; SAR26]. Distributions were $323M in FY2025 (13.5% of opening NAV) and $250M in the six months to Apr 2026 [AR25; SAR26]. This matters for taxable sleeves.

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4. Performance and Drawdowns

Reported returns, Class Inst, net, to 30 Sep 2026 [FS26]:

Calendar years, Inst vs. index [FS26]: 2021: +39.2 vs +29.9 · 2022: −31.5 vs −30.8 · 2023: +45.5 vs +53.3 · 2024: +26.7 vs +32.9 · 2025: +35.4 vs +23.5. The best quarter was Q2 2020 (+31.58%) and the worst Q2 2022 (−21.17%), both Class A [SP26]. Three-year standard deviation was 25.1%, against 20.9% for the index [FS26].

What drove the last 12 months [Attr26 p.2, gross, 12 months to Sep 2026]. The fund returned 65.48% against 30.93% for the index, an excess of 34.55 points. Allocation added 13.37 and selection 21.18. By industry, Electrical Equipment (essentially Bloom, +226.6%) added 15.24, semiconductors 11.90, hardware 7.63 and software 6.20. Bloom alone contributed 17.73 points, about 27% of total return. The excess was therefore not purely a Bloom effect: selection in semiconductors and hardware also added materially.

The most recent quarter reversed [Attr26 p.1, Q3 2026 gross]. The fund returned −0.42% against +6.23% for the index. Semis selection cost 2.91 points; the detractors were Lam −24%, Applied Materials −29% and Western Digital −29%. Bloom fell 8.0% from a 10.9% starting weight. Class A monthly returns for May, June and July 2026 were +11.26%, +5.03% and −8.04% [NP-Jul26].

Drawdown read. In 2022 the fund fell roughly in line with the index (−31.5% vs −30.8%) and lost less than the category (−37.4%) [FS26]. It lagged in 2023–24 when mega-cap AI names led. Its strongest relative years were 2021, 2025 and 2026, when its idiosyncratic mid-cap and hardware bets paid off. The return profile looks cyclical around those bets rather than steady, and the fund carries more volatility than the index. The sources contain no monthly series or peak-to-trough drawdown history beyond these figures.

Lux sister fund [Lux25 pp.24–25, to 30 Sep 2025, USD]. Net returns for the IU class were 22.2% a year since its 10 Jan 2020 inception, against 22.1% for the MSCI World IT 10/40 index. Three-year net was 35.2% against 37.7%, and five-year 23.6% against 20.4%. The gross composite returned 24.1% a year over 10 years against 23.0%. As of Sep 2025 the Lux vehicle's net record was about index-like since inception. The US fund's numbers through Sep 2026 include the later Bloom-driven run.

Flows: performance-driven AUM. Gross sales minus redemptions, excluding reinvestment:

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5. Strategy and Edge

What the manager says it does [RFP24 pp.6–12; Lux25 pp.17–22]. The team invests globally in tech and tech-related companies, which per the prospectus includes "medical, environmental and biotechnology" [SP26]. The approach is bottom-up and GARP. The team focuses on value-chain power relative to suppliers and customers, free cash flow, and company models built product line by product line. It runs channel checks with VARs and draws on third-party data such as M-Science, YipitData and SimilarWeb. It favours "logical takeover targets" and mid-caps. It describes itself as sometimes contrarian, "early to a trend before the idea reaches consensus". It will flip IPOs and do merger arbitrage. Most holdings are US-based by choice. The team runs 50–75 positions with 50–150 bp entry weights.

Edge: claim, evidence and what still needs work.

• Claim: Silicon Valley proximity plus specialised sub-sector analysts with long tenure. Evidence: the 10-year excess return is positive net of fees (+3.0 points a year vs. the index) [FS26]. Twelve-month selection effects are positive across semis, hardware and software [Attr26]. Still to diligence: how persistent the excess is outside a few large winners. Calendar 2023–24 trailed the index by 6–8 points a year.
• Claim: valuation discipline, avoiding stocks "priced for perfection" [RFP24 p.6]. Evidence: weighted trailing P/E was 23.4 at Sep 2026 [FS26]. The sources give no position-level valuation history, so I cannot test whether the discipline held for the largest winner.
• Claim: mid-cap emphasis. Evidence against: the weighted-average cap is $924B and the >$100B bucket held 49.8% of the Lux fund at Sep 2025 [FS26; Lux25 p.29]. The fund still held 23.5% in $10–25B names, against 5.5% for the index [Lux25 p.29].

Where it should work, and where it struggles. On the evidence above, it should do well in fundamentals-led, dispersed tech markets that reward hardware and semicap cycles and idiosyncratic winners. It is likely to struggle in narrow mega-cap-led markets (2023–24) and in sharp reversals of crowded cyclical semicap trades (Q3 2026).

Mandate breadth. At Apr 2026 Information Technology was only 67.6% of the fund. The rest was Industrials 14.7%, Communication Services 9.4%, Financials 3.8%, Consumer Discretionary 2.5% and Utilities 0.5% [SAR26]. This fits the prospectus definition of "technology-related", but it makes the fund a broader thematic vehicle than an MSCI World IT benchmark suggests.

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6. Portfolio, Risk and Capacity

Concentration over time:

The fund cut Bloom from 3.05M shares to 1.99M between Oct 2025 and Apr 2026, but the weight still rose [AR25; SAR26]. Persistent breaches of the team's own 8% guideline [RFP24 p.9], with no legal breach because the fund is non-diversified, raise a question about how the independent risk function engaged. The process describes the Investment Risk Management and Investment Risk Committee route as able to instruct the PM to change the portfolio [RFP24 p.13]. Whether it did so is not disclosed.

Derivatives. The fund buys and writes options "to increase return… to protect gains and to facilitate buying and selling" [AR25 notes]. All written calls were on holdings, with Morgan Stanley as counterparty or broker:

• At 31 Oct 2025: liability $7.5M (premiums $3.3M); Bloom calls covered about $72M of notional; collateral pledged $124M.
• At 30 Apr 2026: liability $38.3M (premiums $10.6M), on Bloom, Applied Materials, Marvell, Western Digital, Teradyne and Lam; collateral pledged $341M.

The FY2025 average written-option liability was only $0.66M, and written options lost $5.6M in FY2025 (realised plus unrealised) [AR25]. At Jul 2026 option lines were about −0.09% of NAV [NP-Jul26]. The fund is a "limited derivatives user" under Rule 18f-4 and option writing is not a principal strategy [Pro26]. The overlay seems to have grown after the 2024 hire of a head of derivative strategies (inferred from timing, not stated).

Liquidity and capacity. Neither ADV-based liquidity nor firm-wide aggregate ownership of names like Bloom is in the sources. The same team runs $14.1B in the sister US tech fund, plus hedge funds and about 335 SMAs, with similar holdings likely (inferred) [RFP24 p.5; SAI26 p.148]. Firm-wide days-to-exit for the top positions is therefore the key capacity question. Turnover was 25% in FY2025 and 17% in the six months to Apr 2026, against a Lux estimate of 30–75% [AR25; SAR26; Lux25 p.11]. Cash ran at 2–3.5% [FS26; Lux25 p.26]. The fund does not borrow [NP-Jul26]. It has access to a shared committed credit facility with about 11 banks [NCEN].

Geographic mandate. The prospectus requires generally at least 40% (or 30% in unfavourable conditions) in companies outside the US. Those companies are defined to include US-domiciled firms with ≥50% of revenue or assets abroad [SP26]. By domicile, the fund was 91.4% US at Apr 2026 [SAR26] and 95.9% US & Canada at Sep 2026 [FS26]. Compliance therefore depends on the revenue test, which the sources do not show.

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7. Key Counterparties and ODD Snapshot

Facts worth noting.

• Brokerage commissions were $788K in FY2025, $838K in FY2024 and $403K in FY2023. Of the FY2025 commissions, $172.5K (about 22%) went to firms providing research [SAI26 pp.256, 261].
• The fund paid no commissions to affiliated brokers [SAI26].
• Ameriprise reports no pending proceedings likely to be material to the fund [AR25 Note 11; SAR26].
• For the Lux SICAV, the depositary, administrator, auditor and fee schedule are not in the reviewed sources.

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8. Known / Unknown / Ask Next

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9. Diligence Questions

Incentive alignment

• What are Wick's and Patel's actual holdings in this fund versus the Seligman hedge funds? Is any compensation deferred into fund shares?
• In 2023–25, what share of the team bonus pool came from hedge-fund performance fees versus mutual-fund management fees?
• Why do three of the six named team members hold no shares?
• How are allocations of scarce ideas (IPOs, mid-cap adds) split between the performance-fee vehicles and this fund? Has the fund ever held a name that the hedge funds were short?

Edge and repeatability

• Excluding Bloom, Lam and Western Digital, what was the fund's excess return over 3 and 5 years?
• What was the original thesis on Bloom, and how was "valuation-aware" applied as the stock rose about 227% in the past year?
• How has the opportunity set changed now that the fund holds 15% non-IT (industrials and power)? Is "AI power" now part of the mandate?

Performance and drawdowns

• What happened in Q3 2026 (−6.65 points gross vs. the index)? Is this the same semicap and storage exposure that drove 2025's gains?
• Why did the fund lag by 6–8 points a year in 2023–24, and what did the team change afterwards?
• What was the peak-to-trough drawdown in 2022, and how long did recovery take?

Team stability

• What is the succession plan for Wick, and when is a handover to Patel expected?
• Has anyone left or joined the 14-person team since Sep 2025?
• How do the short-focused analysts (Noell, Gmitro) feed into a long-only fund?

Risk, financing and capacity

• Was the 5%/8% position guideline formally changed or waived for Bloom? Did IRM or the IRC escalate it?
• What are the purpose, limits and approval process of the covered-call overlay? Who runs it, Wilshire or the PMs? Why did the written-call liability reach $38M?
• What are firm-wide aggregate holdings and days-to-exit at 20% of ADV for the top 10 names?
• How is the 40% non-US policy measured today, and what is the current non-US percentage under the revenue test?

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10. Reference Check Prep

• Current investors. Was the Bloom concentration flagged to you before it showed up in holdings reports? How did the team explain Q3 2026?
• Former investors. What drove redemptions in a top-decile period, for example platform or model changes, concentration discomfort, or taxes?
• Former employees. How much do analysts influence sizing versus Wick? How are disagreements resolved? How do hedge-fund priorities affect the long-only book?
• Service providers (custody, administrator, auditor). Did the JPMorgan-to-State Street move raise any reconciliation or pricing issues? Has valuation of restricted or fair-valued names ever been an issue? (CyberArk was fair-valued at 0.03% in Apr 2026 [SAR26].)

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11. Suggested Materials Request List

1. Monthly net returns since inception (Class Inst and Class A), plus rolling 3-year excess vs. MSCI World IT.
2. Holdings-based attribution for 2021–2026 by year, showing each year's top 5 contributors and detractors.
3. Position-limit policy (current version) and a log of guideline exceptions since 2024, including Bloom and Lam.
4. Derivatives and option-overlay policy, and monthly written-option notional since 2024.
5. Firm-wide aggregate holdings across all Seligman vehicles for the top 20 names, with liquidity analysis.
6. Trade allocation, cross-trade and side-by-side conflict policies covering hedge funds, mutual funds and SMAs.
7. Exact PM and team holdings, and bonus-pool composition by source (2023–2025).
8. Succession plan and team org chart as of now, including leavers since 2020.
9. IRC or IRM summary of reviews for this fund (2024–2026).
10. Quarterly commentaries from 2024 to the present. The IR copy in sources/ is a placeholder.
11. For the Lux SICAV: prospectus and KIID, fee schedule, depositary, administrator, auditor, and a holdings comparison with the US fund.

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12. Sources Reviewed

Thin or missing sources. There is no DDQ for the US fund and no 2026 team or organisation document. Commentaries are missing (placeholder files). There are no monthly return series or pre-2026 annual reports, so performance before FY2021 rests only on fact-sheet periods. All EDGAR collection was filtered to 2026 filings (see SEC_filings_manifest.md). Earlier N-CSRs would let the Bloom position and the option overlay be traced back further.