Real estate, Thailand, Philippines and high-yield funds are performing well

Gold bars at the Zlatarna Celje in Celje, Slovenia. Gold has slumped almost 30 per cent since its peak in September 2011. Photo: Reuters

Real estate, Thailand, the Philippines and high-yield bonds are strong investments while gold has fallen abruptly off the radar

If you are looking to invest, you might be wondering what are the top performing funds? We can answer that. Using data from research firm Lipper, we list the best funds available in Hong Kong, ranked by returns net of fees, over the 12 months to February.

The findings can be summed up thus: real estate, Thailand, Philippines and high-yield bonds have all performed well, but gold has been a disaster.

Funds dedicated to the Philippines and Thailand rank highest among the equity funds. All the top bond funds are in high yield.

At the bottom are investment-grade bonds, particularly those priced in pounds, and anything involved with gold.

High yield

Hongkongers buy more high-yield funds than any other fund category. And when Hong Kong investors want high-yield bonds, they usually want exposure to the mainland property sector.

Jack Deino, a senior portfolio manager for Invesco, manages an emerging market fund that is the third-best fund in the bond category. The fund's second-biggest country exposure is China, and Deino says about 90 per cent of his China bonds come from the property sector.

Mainland property bonds have been strong performers over the past year, in terms of yield and capital gains. But the sector is prone to busts. Regulators routinely bring mainland property firms to the brink of insolvency by rounds of tough rules on mortgages and bank loans, to cool an overheated market.

Bond fund managers are wary of concentration risk. They worry that the government may one day roll out heavy-handed cooling measures, walloping the whole property sector, taking their portfolio down with it.

Deino says these concerns are overstated. "Chinese property is the most misunderstood sector in the world," he says, adding the mainland market is diversified just in sheer size ("each region or each city marches to the beat of its own drummer and has its own demand").

He adds that the big listed mainland developers need bond markets to raise money, and are therefore expert at investor relations, and operate at a high level of transparency and governance.

BEA Union Investment is also focused on mainland property bonds. About half of the firm's Asian bond and currency fund (the second-best performing bond fund) is invested in the asset, says Henry Wong, the firm's head of fixed income.

"In January [last year], we made a very aggressive move into this sector, which is why our performance in 2012 is strong," Wong says.

BEA launched its fund in August 2008 at the height of the global credit crisis. It offered beleaguered investors high-quality Asian-currency alternatives to US and European bonds. At launch, about 80 per cent of the fund was investment grade, says Wong. The fund has since been marching steadily down the credit curve, investing in higher risk and higher return securities. Today, only 10 per cent of the fund is investment grade - much of the rest is high-yield debt from mainland developers.

High yield has risks, but so does high grade. The bottom performing funds in the bond table are all invested in investment-grade bonds from the developed market. The funds lost money largely because yields on such instruments are paltry, barely enough to cover the costs of the fund.

Currency swings are also a factor. Two of the bottom performing funds are in sterling bonds, and the pound lost 4.4 per cent against the Hong Kong dollar over the review period.

SCMP

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TIME Magazine : President PNOY - 2nd Worlds Most Influential person, a notch higher Barack Obama

Philippine President Benigno Aquino III - 2nd worlds' most influential person.  LLUSTRATION BY DAVID DESPAU FOR TIME. 

An honorable time

WITH all the negative issues and events currently ongoing, both in the Philippines and around the globe, this comes as a refreshing bit of good news.

Recently, President Benigno Aquino III (PNoy) emerged as one of TIME Magazine's 100 most influential people in the world for 2013.

PNoy ranks second among the world's 23 most influential leaders, next to Rand Paul (a junior US senator from Kentucky) and a notch higher than President Barack Obama, who is in third place.

"In a country of nicknames, Filipinos proudly call their President PNoy — a pun on the word they use for themselves: Pinoy. For his courage, however, he really should have the pet name the family gave his eldest sister Maria Elena: Ballsy," wrote TIME news director, Howard Chua-Eoan, to describe Aquino.

Chua-Eoan said that while PNoy may have inherited the legacy of his parents, Sen. Benigno Aquino, Jr. and former Pres. Corazon C. Aquino, he "quickly began making his own name."

"The sputtering economy stabilized and became hot. Aquino pushed through a reproductive-rights law that many said was impossible in the fervently Catholic nation. Most important, he became the face of the regional confrontation with Beijing over its claim to virtually all of the South China Sea. It is a brave stance, the long-term consequences still unknown,"Chua-Eoan further said.

PNoy reacted modestly to this recognition, saying that he is merely the "face" of Filipinos.

"This is perhaps a recognition of our countrymen, of all Filipinos, more than anything else. I'm just the face. Like in battles, I'm just the first one to move forward, and I accept that. But if there is any triumph, it's a triumph for everybody," he said.

"We have been reminded that we did quite a lot in terms of achievements. It's clear to me that we only did this because the people are behind me," PNoy further said.

The president credits his motivation to the public's support of the reforms that his administration initiated.

"...because our countrymen are there behind us, they are the ones that gave us the opportunity to reform and continue to support us until now, then I can accept with much honor that distinction – on their behalf rather than for myself," PNoy said.

According to Presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda, TIME Magazine's article recognized "the true grit which characterizes his (Mr. Aquino's) leadership, and the optimism, dynamism and renewed pride which has restored the standing of our nation in the eyes of Filipinos and the world."

"We take pride in how the ideas of good governance and inclusive growth that are the major thrusts of the Aquino presidency resonate not just with Filipinos but with the entire world. This is especially relevant today, as countries all over are trying to become more inclusive economically, politically, and even culturally, President Aquino is already doing it in the Philippines," Lacierda said.

Of course, not everyone feels the same way.

Some senatoriables gave mixed feedback about this recognition.

Sen. Gregorio Honasan thinks that PNoy's inclusion in the list is not enough to make Filipinos feel the benefits of economic growth.

"We should be happy, but that will not be enough to convince our people that our economy is growing...This honor is deserved I think, but for our people to be equally proud and to feel this on the ground, we should do more than recognize the President," Honasan said.

Zambales Rep. Mitos Magsaysay opined that PNoy being regarded as a most influential person/leader does not mean much for the poor.

"The ordinary Filipinos are concerned about where to get money they can use to feed their families, how to survive the next day, what will be their job to generate income. That is the focus of ordinary Filipinos," she said.

Nevertheless, this should still be a cause for elation and celebration among Filipinos.

While the Philippines continues to flourish (albeit slowly but surely) and be regarded with more respect in the global community, there are things that we are better off removing from our own "list" -- crab mentality most of all.

After all, PNoy said it best: his victory is our victory.

With report from Asian Journal and Time Magazine  

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