BT looks East for expansion
BT Funds Management is banking on its belief that there has been a fundamental shift in the Japanese economy by establishing a new sector fund investing in this market.
Tuesday, February 15th 2000, 12:00AM
The BT Japanese Growth Fund will be launched in May and it is the first new fund rolled out by the company for many years. Also, it is the first major product announcement made since US-based Principal Financial Group bought the business a year ago.
The Japanese economic turnaround was one of the 1999's big stories with the sharemarket finishing up 46 per percent and the yen rising by 88 per cent.
BT says it is launching this fund as Japan has been going through a period of economic recovery and corporate restructuring which has created a range of investment opportunities
Japanese companies have moved away from their traditional "stakeholder" investment base towards a greater focus on profitability and shareholders. (For more detail see Features section later today).
Alongside the launch of the new fund BT is changing the investment mandate of its Pacific Basin fund. From March 16 the Pacific Basin Fund will no longer include Japanese shares in its list of possible investments.
The Pacific Basin Fund will continue to invest in a portfolio of Asian shares, which may include investments in, for example, Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand.
"In recent years, we have seen the emerging South East Asian economies develop significantly and we believe the Asian region continues to present an attractive investment proposition for long term investors," BT says.
While the Pacific Basin Fund has previously held investments in Japan, exposure to this market over the past 12 months has been minimal and therefore the change will not affect the value of your investment.
BT will continue to aim to outperform the benchmark of the fund (the MSCI AC Asia (ex Japan) Free Index) – over the past 12 months (to 1 February 2000), the fund has outperformed its benchmark by more than 25 per cent.
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