Asset Management Awards for Excellence 2022 – Best Fund Provider – Asia Pacific Bond

Best Fund Provider Asia Pacific Bond

 

DWS Investments

Best Fund Provider – Asia Pacific Bond

Vanessa Wang

head of Client Coverage, Asia-Pacific

“We are elated to win this award this year. The award is a testament to the strength of our Asian Fixed Income team led by Henry Wong, head of Asia fixed income, APAC. The fund’s consistent outperformance has reaped rewards for clients and we look to continue our track record.”

Winnersrationale

In a year when Asian credit markets were rocked by a sell-off in Chinese high-yield bonds, the DWS Invest Asian Bonds Fund navigated market volatility to deliver alpha to private banking clients in the region.

The German asset manager’s flagship Asian fixed-income strategy — which has assets under management of just over US$2 billion — focuses on bottom-up credit selection mostly across hard currency bonds. During the assessment period, the fund was boosted by a benchmark-agnostic approach that allowed for a lower exposure to China than some of its peers.

The investment team, led by Asian fixed-income veteran Henry Wong, targets market mispricings that, it says, are often the result of sharp changes in sentiment among the region’s investors.

The portfolio managers managed to obtain a positive contribution from the fund’s China allocation by focusing selectively on a handful of names in high-yield credit (those rated ‘BB’ or above). The strategy benefited from a tactical allocation to Huarong Finance, which became the largest holding in DWS Invest Asian Bonds near the start of 2021. The fund’s managers astutely calculated that the troubled state-backed finance company — whose bonds were heavily sold off by investors — would likely be bailed out by the Chinese government.

As a result, the fund outperformed across several timelines. In November 2021, DWS Invest Asian Bonds had returned 1.1% YTD in dollar terms, beating a 2.1% loss for the J.P. Morgan Asian Credit Index. On a five- and three-year basis, the fund has returned 4.7% and 5.6%, respectively, versus the benchmark’s 3.9% and 5.5%.

The unconstrained approach of DWS Invest Asian Bonds, which allows capital to be deployed across both the investment grade and high-yield spectrum, unearthed other alpha-generating opportunities throughout 2021. Those included the metals and mining sectors in India and Indonesia, which were boosted by a rally in global commodity prices. A focus on shorter duration helped to mitigate the worst market sell-offs triggered by rising US Treasury yields.

DWS Investments is Asian Private Banker’s Best Fund Provider – Asia Pacific Bond for 2022.


Contact Us
All awards related enquiries to
awards@asianprivatebanker.com
+852 2529 4277