The Globe and Mail reports in its Tuesday edition that more than one-third of mutual funds and exchange-traded funds sold in Canada are subadvised, meaning that the asset manager that distributes them has outsourced the management of the fund's portfolio. Guest columnist Danielle LeClair writes that the group in charge of the investment management is known as the subadviser. From a practical standpoint, it is possible that the distributing firm does not have the internal capabilities to manage the fund's mandate. Most distributors of mutual funds conduct market intelligence exercises to determine what kind of strategies investors are interested in at any given time. In some cases, they might identify a strategy that would be of interest to investors but may not have in-house investment expertise in that area. The distributing firm may also have an ownership stake in the subadviser's firm or may have a strategic partnership with the subadviser's firm and therefore want to provide it with broader distribution. For example, Sun Life Global Investments distributes funds managed by MFS Investments, a firm owned by Sun Life, while TD Asset Management distributes funds managed by T. Rowe Price, a firm it has partnered with.