Leading investment research house, Independent Investment Research (“IIR”), has upgraded its rating of Asian Masters Fund Limited (ASX:AUF) to Recommended Plus. The Listed Investment Company (“LIC”) is a multi-manager investment vehicle that provides exposure to between 8 and 20 select Asian equities fund managers.
AUF is benchmark unaware, with the Investment Manager taking distinct country, sector and thematic tilts as expressed by the selection and portfolio weighting of the underlying fund managers. As such, the Fund has for some time reflected a strong play on the Asian consumer, particularly the Chinese and Indian consumer, and it has also been materially overweight (relative to the MSCI Asia ex Japan index) the more ‘emerging’ country end of the spectrum.
As a point of difference to many other Asian equities investment vehicles, the Fund invests in China A- Shares managed funds and historically its exposure to this market has been significant.
From a portfolio perspective, IIR sees the fund as having three key points of difference.
1. It is effectively high conviction investment mandate in which the Manager makes strong country and sectoral ‘bets’, as expressed by the selection and portfolio weighting of underlying managed funds;
2. The Fund can indirectly invest in China A-Shares through its manager selection;
3. Expect for the foreseeable future the Fund to remain relatively overweight the more ‘emerging’ end of the MSCI Asia ex Japan spectrum.
Independent Investment Research analyst, Peter Rae, said: “The Fund provides a differentiated exposure to Asia ex Japan equities and it provides a strong play on the thematically attractive Asian consumer sectors. Most of the Fund’s peers do not have exposure to China A-Shares.
“Historic performance has been solid, with the Fund generally outperforming. There has also been a broad distribution of positive attribution, with the Fund outperforming based on both country tilts and with a broad number of underlying fund managers,” Mr Rae said.