The Ucits-compliant Fidelity Emerging Asia Fund, as with its €679m (£423m) offshore equivalent, will be managed by Teera Chanpongsang who is based in Hong Kong. The majority of his existing portfolio is in China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand although he can invest more widely into frontier Asian markets such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.
The new onshore offering is a mirror image of the offshore fund and will typically invest in between 80 and 120 stocks from a universe of almost 1,000. It will be benchmarked against Custom MSCI Emerging Asia Composite Index with an initial charge of 3.5% and an annual management charge of 1.5%.
In terms of where he is currently invested, Chanpongsang comments: “In China, I favour the consumer discretionary and internet businesses, which are benefiting from the structural growth in demand.
“I think the energy and materials companies in Thailand are well placed to benefit from the demand growth in the region. In the Philippines, I am overweight in the consumer food manufacturers as well as the industrials sector. I also like banks in both these countries as they benefit from sustained economic growth.
He also likes Indonesia’s long-term story adding that its commodity-rich economy is behind only China and India and has strong demographics.
