Tag: frontier markets

The Cayman Islands-based investment company has finished fundraising for its Cambodia fund and launched two Sri Lanka funds. ING Investment Management’s Dubai-based team plans to launch a frontier-market product for global investors that will include both equity and debt. Research published this week highlights the difficulties of emerging-market investing and suggests some broad strategies. Higher oil prices and an improvement in risk appetite are needed to revive general interest in the small and less liquid markets. Taking advantage of historically attractive share prices, Franklin Templeton launches three funds that invest in frontier markets, smaller Asian companies, and Europe. The new closed-end fund is managed by Ruchir Sharma and Tim Drinkall from New York. JF Asset Management portfolio manager Rajendra Nair says oil prices, food inflation and risk appetite are the key concerns for frontier markets. Templeton’s Mark Mobius says poor information, lack of liquidity and sudden policy changes are the main risks of investing in frontier markets. EPFR Global is expanding its coverage of frontier markets to meet increasing demand from clients, says managing director Brad Durham. The Gam Star Frontier Opportunities portfolio is the latest to capitalise on the growing demand for Middle East investments. This latest fund excludes South Korea and Taiwan which are considered developing markets economically but are still trapped in the emerging category due to reasons related to ... The new index presents an alternative investment opportunity for those looking for stocks not closely correlated to US blue-chips. Both are in response to demand from investors seeking new markets and a tradable proxy for the broader Asia ex-Japan index.