Second Japanese fund coming

The announcement that BT Funds Management is to launch a Japanese equity fund has encouraged London-based Fleming Asset Management to advance plans to dual list its trust on the New Zealand sharemarket.

Thursday, March 2nd 2000, 12:00AM

by Philip Macalister

The announcement that BT Funds Management is to launch a Japanese equity fund has encouraged London-based Fleming Asset Management to advance plans to dual list its trust on the New Zealand sharemarket.

The Fleming Japanese fund is a UK investment trust that is currently listed on the London Stock Exchange. It was established in 1927 and currently has total assets of £1105 million.

Fleming plan to have the fund listed in New Zealand within the next month.

"We are one year into a multi-year bull market in Japan," Fleming Investment Management director Andrew Watkins says.

He says the portfolio is currently tilted towards mid-cap growth stocks and growth industries as that is where the fastest growth is likely to happen.

Watkins says that Japan's restructuring is working and the economy is recovering.

"Flemings are strong believers in the positive prospects offered by the 'new Japan', particularly in technology orientated stocks," Credit Suisse First Boston investment trust specialist Peter Irwin says.

The fund is "one of the cleanest ways of getting exposure to mainstream Japan."

Currently the Fleming fund has a three star rating from Standard and Poor's Micropal*. This rating system is similar to what IPAC uses in New Zealand. Three stars means it's in the 31 per cent to 50 per cent band.

*Micropal calculates its rankings using a fund's monthly performance relative to its sector average for each of the 36 months over the three years to date. The average and volatility of these 36 numbers is used to calculate a funds star rating.

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