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The list of reasons to invest in APAC is compelling and institutional investors in the region are increasingly tapping the opportunities. Top1000funds.com looks at the different levels of income, volatility, efficiency and ultimately returns across the region.
active management, Asia, Franklin Templeton, GPIF, New Zealand Super
Portfolios built for the old world will be severely tested as emerging forces rewrite the rules of investing. The Fiduciary Investors Symposium heard that geopolitical and macroeconomic upheaval, together with the disruption wrought by AI, should force asset owners to rethink the structure and composition of portfolios.
Looking back at the portfolios of large institutional investors during and after the dot.com crash and the GFC, CEM Benchmarking, reveals commonality in the portfolios that thrived. For both events the top quartile returns were more than 2 per cent higher than the bottom quartile. Analysing the asset allocation and behaviour of investors showed two clear themes: top quartile performers had more defensive allocations pre-crash; and rebalancing is a tailwind for performance.
The Harvard endowment is about half way through its transition to external investment management and will work with its service providers to implement the university’s new directive, to position the portfolio in line with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
A risk management strategy that measures resilience and fragility of markets, protected portfolios from the wild February downswing in equity markets, and predicts more fragility to come.
COVID-19 lockdowns have highlighted the risks in infrastructure, that have been there all along. The realisation that infrastructure assets represent significant risk exposures, that should be understood and managed, will determine the coming of age of the infrastructure asset class.
From December to mid-March of this year New Zealand Super lost 20 per cent of its assets. It’s the second time in less than 18 months the fund has experienced a significant drop in assets but in an example of how good governance and process can allow for counter cyclical behaviour the fund is now buying equities.
Investors are putting pressure on companies to accelerate the shift to purpose-driven leadership and focus on human capital policies during the crisis. But while there are some examples of corporations making policy changes that positively impact their workers, supply chain issues pose a significant problem.
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