A Swedish institutional client has become the first investor to use Signet Group’s latest innovation: a share class denominated in a basket of Asian currencies. The multi-million dollar investment came from a client that has been invested in Signet funds-of-funds for several years.
The UK- and US-based absolute-return multi-manager investment specialist, normally denominates its funds in major currencies for its predominantly institutional client base. (Until recently, Signet also offered a share class denominated in gold.)
By contrast, Signet’s new Asian Currency Index (ACI) share class is hedged to a pool of Asian currencies using HSBC’s new Asia Weighted Index. Devised in conjunction with Signet, the Asia Weighted Index includes the Chinese yuan but not the Japanese yen. Investors would still subscribe in their base currency; however, that is then hedged to the basket of Asian currencies.
Robert Marquardt (pictured), Signet’s chairman and co-head of investment management, says: “We believe Asian currencies will likely appreciate versus the G-4 fiat currencies in the medium term, acting as a store of value – and that interest-rate differentials will likely be higher in Asia as well. The new share class allows G-4 investors who share our view to express it in a way that was generally not possible before now, other than in equities.”
Tim Gardner, global head of sales, says: “Our investment process has always started with a top-down, 30,000-foot view of world. We got it right on the long-term rise of gold, and we hope to get it right here, too. We are happy to see that institutional investors are starting to agree with us."
