HLG Unit Trust Bhd Launches The HLG Asia- Pacific Dividend Fund
HLG Unit Trust Bhd officially launched its first regional fund, the HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund today, increasing its existing portfolio of product offerings to 17 unit trust funds.
During the launch ceremony, the new Fund was jointly unveiled by Mr. Raymond Choong, President of Hong Leong Credit and Mr. Richard Lin, Executive Director and CEO of HLG Asset Management Sdn Bhd together with Mr. Murray Coble, Managing Director of Schroders for South Asia.
The HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund is an equity growth and income fund that intends to invest in securities in Asia-Pacific countries, excluding Japan, aiming at securities that generates attractive dividend yield. The Fund seeks to provide investors with steady recurring income that is potentially higher than the average fixed deposit rates. At the same time, the Fund also attempts to attain medium-to-long term capital gains from investing in high quality dividend yielding securities.
The HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund is designed for investors who are seeking stable investment returns and a greater diversification in their investment holdings through regional exposure from countries in the Asia-Pacific region, excluding Japan.
“To achieve the fund objective of regular income, the Fund’s strategy is to invest in equities with good dividend payout policies and potential for capital appreciation,” said Richard Lin, Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of HLG Asset Management Sdn. Bhd.
“With the HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund, investors are able to invest in the fastest growing region in a relatively safe and convenient manner. With a mixture of local as well as offshore investments, it provides investors an access to lucrative markets with potentially high attractive returns” he added.
HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund will be managed by Schroder Investment Management (Singapore) Ltd who has been appointed as the external foreign investment manager. Schroders Singapore is the Group’s centre of excellence for managing Asia Pacific ex Japan investment portfolios whereby its assets under management stand at S$23 billion as at 31 December 2005.
The foreign markets which have been approved for the Fund are Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan and Thailand. However, other foreign markets within the Asia-Pacific markets will also be constantly looked into as it may become viable for investment.
Market exposure for the HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund would be between 50-95% in the foreign markets and a maximum of 50% locally. The asset allocation for the Fund would be between 50-95% in equities and between 0-30% in fixed income securities.
Launching of new funds is one of the three pronged expansion strategy executed to increase HLG Unit Trust Bhd’s market share in the industry. To meet the growing sophistication of the market for offshore products, HLG UT is planning to roll out several additional innovative unit trust products into the market.
The new regional fund will play an important role in positioning HLG Unit Trust Bhd in its strategy to be among the largest unit trust companies in the industry. Currently, HLG Unit Trust Bhd already manages a diverse product range that includes a selection of Islamic Syariah-compliant unit trusts, growth funds, equity funds, balanced funds, sectoral funds as well as bond funds.
The HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund has a total approved fund size of 500 million units priced at RM 0.50 per unit during the initial offer period (from February 28 2006 till March 20 2006). Minimum initial investment for HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund is RM 1,000 while the minimum additional investment is RM 100.
Available immediately, HLG Asia-Pacific Dividend Fund is distributed through both HLG Unit Trust Bhd’s agency force as well as Institutional Unit Trust Agents (IUTA). HLG Asia-Pacific Fund is available through selected HLG Unit Trust Bhd’s existing IUTAs namely, Hong Leong Bank Berhad, HSBC Bank Malaysia Bhd, United Overseas Bank (Malaysia) Bhd, Standard Chartered Bank Malaysia Berhad, Affin Bank Berhad and Commerce International Merchant Bankers Berhad.
About HLG Unit Trust Bhd
Incorporated on October 5 1994, HLG Unit Trust Bhd is an established unit trust management company, and a member of the Hong Leong Group Malaysia. Its core business is the management of unit trust funds.
Here at HLG Unit Trust Bhd, everything we do reflects our tagline “Making Opportunities Work”. Making opportunities work is central to what we do. In the world of investment, it is all about being able to spot the right opportunities and at HLG Unit Trust Bhd, we strive to make them work for our investors.
Today, the company manages 17 unit trust funds, which are distributed nationwide through multiple channels. Direct and channel distribution activities are supported by the HLG Unit Trust Bhd’s strategic nationwide sales support infrastructure. This includes our headquarters in Kuala Lumpur and six sales support offices nationwide in Kuala Lumpur, Ipoh, Penang, Johor Bahru, Kuching and Kota Kinabalu.
As at December 31 2005, HLG Unit Trust Bhd has a combined total fund size of RM 1.71 billion.
About Schroders
Schroders is an independent international asset management and private banking group, with more than 200 years experience in financial service and over USD209 billion under management as at 30 September 2005.
With almost 300 portfolio managers and analysts as at 31 December 2005 covering the world’s investment markets in Europe, the Americas, Emerging markets and Asia-Pacific, Schroders have one of the largest global networks of offices dedicated to asset management.
Schroders has committed significant resources to the Asia Pacific region and has been managing client assets in Asia since the 1970s. One of Schroders strengths is the depth of their local investment and research resources, evidenced by a network of 9 offices in the Asia Pacific Region, 7 Asia-Pacific ex Japan equity portfolio managers and 21 research analysts (as at 31 December 2005) covering more than 2700 company visits in 2004.