Top 10 most-popular investment funds: January 2026

Like its bow-and-arrow-wielding Greek goddess namesake, Artemis Global Income fund has shot down Royal London Short Term Money Market from the top of the podium.

In the same way that investors flocked to growth-focused fund house Baillie Gifford a few years, investors are now gravitating towards the Artemis stable, including top-performing Artemis Global Income I Acc. The fund has a value investing theme, is light on US exposure (a 32% weighting, according to its December factsheet), and has returned to date 48%, 113% and 168% over the usual one, three and five-year periods.

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My colleague Dave Baxter recently undertook a forensic analysis of the fund, comparing the current high flyer with rival funds in the Investment Association’s (IA) global equity income sector.

Artemis Global Income’s top 10 holdings include Deutsche Bank AG (XETRA:DBK), Samsung Electronics Co Ltd DR (LSE:SMSN) and Standard Chartered (LSE:STAN), and investors can own it for 0.83%.

Other Artemis funds that are enjoying a strong run of form include ninth-ranked Artemis SmartGARP European Equity I Acc GBP. SmartGARP stands for Smart Growth At a Reasonable Price. However,the same analytical article also points out that “one common trait for many of the [Artemis] funds is that several have big allocations to the financials sector”. Investors who already have plenty of exposure to banks and the like may wish to steer clear to maintain adequate diversification.

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Against a backdrop of gold surpassing $5,600 an ounce in January amid geopolitical tensions of all stripes, Jupiter Gold & Silver I GBP Acc entered the rankings in eighth place. This fund, which is mainly exposed to gold and silver miners rather than the yellow metal itself, has had a stellar one-year performance to date, returning 176%, with the three-year figure at 249%.

However, because of the retrospective nature of this article, it doesn’t reflect investor reaction to the precipitous slide in the gold and silver price – a fall of more than 25% for the latter at the time of writing – on the final working day of January.

As our head of markets Richard Hunter observed in a market report published this morning, “the reasons for the steep declines in gold and especially silver are not immediately obvious”.  

The Jupiter specialist fund therefore could well find itself outside the next top 10 rankings we publish. However, Schroders recently suggested that “the news flow in early 2026 continues to speak loudly to long-cycle geopolitical and fiscal themes”, and that “the evolution of gold from being viewed as a rate-sensitive cyclical hedge to a core ‘anti-fragile’ secular portfolio allocation has a long way to run”.

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Meanwhile, another specialist fund, L&G Global Technology Index I Acc, has slipped to 10th place in the table. This pure-play tech tracker is likely falling out of favour owing to persistent concerns about valuations of US tech stocks and fears of an artificial intelligence (AI) bubble.

Returning to second-ranked Royal London Short Term Money Mkt Y Acc fund, the yield is currently an inflation-beating 3.91%. However, yields on low-risk money market funds will head downhill following any further Bank of England interest rate cuts this year, although there is normally a lag between a base rate cut and a drop in the yield figure.

Global trackers fourth-ranked Vanguard FTSE Global All Cp Idx £ Acc and fifth-ranked HSBC FTSE All-World Index C Acc – both offering low-cost exposure to global markets, including emerging ones, at 0.23% and 0.13% respectively – haven’t changed position since the previous month. Global tracker Fidelity Index World P Acc exited the top 10.

Three multi-asset funds that are stalwarts of the top 10 rankings made up the rest of the table, including Vanguard LifeStrategy 100% Equity A Acc, Vanguard LifeStrategy 80% Equity A Acc, and Vanguard LifeStrategy 60% Equity A Acc.

Vanguard recently announced a shake-up of its LifeStrategy range, including a reduction in home bias to the UK and lower fees.

Our top 10 monthly ranking of the most-bought funds is based on the number of buys during the month, with regular investing excluded.

Top 10 most-popular funds in January 2026

Source: interactive investor. Performance data to 2 February 2026. Note: the top 10 is based on the number of “buys” during the month of January. Past performance is not a guide to future performance.

Top 10 most-bought active funds in January 2026

Our top 10 most-bought active ranking also reflects investors’ hunger for precious metals, with new entry Ninety One Global Gold I Acc £ in ninth place, alongside Jupiter Gold & Silver in third. 

At least two-thirds of the Ninety One fund is invested in the shares of companies involved in the mining of the precious metal. Like its commodities peer Jupiter, the fund has delivered barnstorming returns of 170%, 221% and 237% over the usual three time frames.

Half the table is comprised of Artemis funds, including another new entry, Artemis SmartGARP Global EM Equity I Acc GBP. This £2.4 billion emerging markets fund, which launched in 2015 and has a yearly ongoing charges figure (OCF) of 0.84%, is managed by Raheel Altaf. Its largest country weightings are to China (32.4%), South Korea (13.5%) and Brazil (10.8%), while for sector allocations, it has significant exposure to financials (23%) and information technology (20.3%).

According to the latest available factsheet, holdings in the top 10 include Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd ADR (NYSE:TSM), Taiwanese firm Wiwynn, and Bank Bradesco SA ADR (NYSE:BBD).

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Meanwhile, Artemis SmartGARP UK Equity was identified as one of 58 funds out of 300 equity income options that beat the FTSE 100 over 12 months. Artemis’ proprietary screening tool, and multi-cap approach were highlighted by the author as quirks that helped give it an edge, although its large allocation to financials could deter investors with sufficient weighting to this sector.

Investors are buying both the accumulation (dividends reinvested) and income (dividends paid out) share classes of Artemis Global Income, with the income version our third and final new entry in seventh place.

Value play Ranmore Global Equity Institutional GBP continues to be popular with our customers, although it has dropped down to eighth place.

Falling out of the top 10 are three money market funds: Fidelity Cash W Acc, Vanguard Sterling Short/Term Money Markets A Acc and L&G Cash Trust I Acc.