Quarterly Trust update
Our quarterly updates summarise key activity over the previous quarter, for example any new companies that have been bought or sold and the reasons why.
Pacific Assets Trust quarterly update - Q4 2025
In November 2025, First Sentier Group (FSG) announced a strategic transition of Stewart Investors’ (SI) investment management responsibilities to its affiliate investment team, FSSA Investment Managers (FSSA). This was decided to be in the best interests of our clients, given the significant overlap in SI’s and FSSA’s investment capabilities and our shared history and heritage.
Introducing FSSA Investment Managers
FSSA has been investing in Asia Pacific and Global Emerging Market equities since 1988 as part of the former Stewart Ivory & Company, which subsequently became First State Stewart. After years of organic growth, the First State Stewart team split in two in 2015, leading to the formation of FSSA Investment Managers and Stewart Investors.
Like SI, we are long-term and quality-focused investors. We pay little attention to the index or short-term performance, preferring to focus on generating absolute returns for our clients in the long run. From our research, we aim to construct relatively concentrated portfolios made up of the best ideas that we can find across Asia and emerging markets. As responsible, long-term shareholders, we have integrated sustainability analysis into our investment process and engage extensively with companies on environmental, labour and governance issues.
Following the transition of SI’s portfolios to FSSA, the Pacific Assets Trust portfolio is now being managed by Rizi Mohanty and Martin Lau.
Rizi Mohanty is a Portfolio Manager at FSSA Investment Managers. He joined the team in 2016 and focuses on the Southeast Asian markets as well as Asia ex-Japan equities more broadly. He is the lead manager of the FSSA ASEAN All Cap and FSSA Asian Growth strategies. Rizi has more than 14 years of investment experience and is based in Hong Kong.
Martin Lau is one of the Managing Partners of FSSA Investment Managers. He has been with the team for more than 23 years (since 2002) and worked closely with members of the SI team before the 2015 reorganisation. He is a well-known and experienced investor and is lead manager of a number of FSSA strategies, including FSSA Asian Equity Plus, FSSA Asia Focus, FSSA China Growth and FSSA Hong Kong Growth. Martin has more than 30 years of investment experience and is also based in Hong Kong.
Rizi and Martin are supported by a broader team of investment analysts, with an average of 16 years of investment experience and 8 years tenure with the team. All 15 members of the FSSA investment team are analysts first and foremost, including the portfolio managers, and we spend the majority of our time meeting companies, writing research and seeking quality companies to invest in.
How we invest
FSSA’s investment philosophy, which shares its genesis with SI, has remained broadly unchanged since the First State Stewart team was established in 1988. We focus on identifying quality companies, buying them at a sensible price and holding them for the long term. Most importantly, we invest our clients’ capital as if it were our own. As long-term investors and owners of businesses on behalf of our clients, we look for founders and management teams that act with integrity and risk awareness, and dominant franchises that have the ability to deliver sustainable and predictable returns over the long term.
As a team, we conduct over 1,000 direct company meetings each year across Asia and other emerging markets. The most significant source of investment ideas comes from these company visits and country research trips. We find that our reputation as patient, long-term investors has given us unparalleled access to management, which allows us to gain valuable insights and a thorough understanding of the businesses we want to invest in.
As a result of our long-term time horizon and conservative investment approach, our portfolios – and our performance – can look very different to the index. We shy away from “flavour of the month” themes (such as the current AI-driven boom), and instead look for high-quality companies that can deliver attractive returns for much longer than the market expects – and extend our investment time horizon to capture that advantage. When you own quality businesses, time isn’t a risk – it’s an asset.
Our performance may lag in very buoyant or momentum-driven markets, but we usually compensate very quickly once such bubbles burst. Based on historical data, our long-term track record shows that our portfolios tend to perform better in “normal” markets (-15% to +15% returns over one year) and bear markets (more than 15% decline), than in steeply rising markets (defined as over 15% returns over one year).
A smooth transition
Given the significant overlap in SI’s and FSSA’s investment philosophy and portfolios, we know all the holdings well. As part of the transition, we made a few changes to tilt the portfolio towards companies with stronger cash generation, higher returns and better long-term growth prospects. In general, we are adding to holdings in China, where we have found leading businesses like Tencent, with strong competitive advantages and attractive growth at reasonable valuations. We are reducing exposure to India, mainly in cyclical businesses like Tube Investments of India and Motilal Oswal, where valuations are expensive and the growth outlook has deteriorated.
Below, we highlight a few of the key additions and disposals over the fourth quarter of 2025.
New purchases:
Tencent Holdings is the largest social media network and online gaming company in China, with growing businesses in online advertising, cloud services, e-payments/e-commerce and overseas gaming. Tencent has created an ecosystem of businesses which are unrivalled and should continue growing over the medium term. It has continued to develop new functions within WeChat (such as Video Accounts and Mini Shops), which should slowly improve monetisation and enhance the quality of the franchise. At FSSA, we have been shareholders of Tencent since 2005 and have consistently found the management to be effective long-term stewards of the business. In recent times, we have been impressed by Tencent’s AI strategy and its disciplined approach to technology investments, which aligns with our conservative view on AI capex spending.
Kotak Mahindra Bank (KMB) is one of India’s leading financial services companies – it has consistently improved the strength of its deposit franchise and maintained better asset quality than peers through the business cycle. While the founder, Uday Kotak, has stepped down from his managing director/CEO role due to the central bank’s limits on leadership terms, he remains closely involved as a board director and should ensure that the bank’s risk awareness and long-term thinking is maintained. Meanwhile, the new CEO (Ashok Vaswani) aspires to grow the business further by focusing on consumer banking and digitisation. We expect to see a growing trend of formalised financial savings, benefiting KMB’s insurance, mutual funds and asset management businesses.
Bank Central Asia (BCA) is a leading private bank in Indonesia with 11% loan market share and 17% market share in low-cost deposits (i.e. current accounts and savings accounts, or CASA). We like the bank’s conservative culture and solid management, backed by a stable and long-term owner in the Hartono family. BCA’s advantages in transaction banking has created a large pool of low-cost deposits for the bank which is hard to replicate. BCA then lends sensibly to good borrowers and earns a healthy return on equity (ROE), averaging over 20% over the past 10 years. In addition, BCA was early to invest in digitisation in Indonesia, which has since accelerated its customer acquisition. BCA remains very profitable, and we believe it has the ability to compound book value at high rates without taking on too much risk. Low household debt in Indonesia should provide a favourable backdrop for continued growth.
Complete sales:
Naver was sold on strength to consolidate the portfolio into higher conviction ideas. While the shares have bounced due to excitement around Korea and AI, we believe the business faces structural challenges in terms of slowing e-commerce growth, and we have been concerned about their lack of financial discipline in the past.
Motilal Oswal Financial Services is a non-bank financial company (NBFC) in India. We sold out of a lower conviction holding to raise cash for better ideas elsewhere.
Milkyway Intelligent Supply Chain is a chemical materials logistics company in China. We sold out of the position on concerns about leverage and poor cash generation.
Performance and outlook
With our long-term investment time horizon, we tend not to pay much attention to short-term market fluctuations. We invest on at least a three-to-five-year view, though we often hold on to companies for much longer. In an industry rife with short-termism, we believe our long-term approach stands out from the crowd.
What we have seen, over the past few decades, is that average holding periods for stocks have fallen from over eight years in the 1960s to less than six months today. Yet this shift has come at a cost: it reduces investors’ ability to generate outsized returns that are materially different from the broader market. The reason is simple — as investment horizons shrink, so does the return dispersion between the best- and worst-performing companies. With less time in the market, investors end up tracking the index, not beating it.
Emerging Markets: time horizons matter
MSCI EM Index -dispersion around mean return for top 10% top / bottom stock performers
Source: MSCI Emerging Markets Index, as at 31 May 2025
In a world where markets rise consistently, that might seem like an acceptable outcome. But markets don’t move in straight lines; and in addition to the higher costs and transaction fees that come with frantic trading activity, the bigger issue is that investors miss out on what is far more important – the future value creation that the best companies tend to generate. This is often poorly understood by the market, with many investors simply focusing on the next quarter or year ahead. Yet the real drivers of returns lie in the cash flows that come well beyond that timeframe.
With that context in mind, we highlight the key contributors and detractors from performance over the fourth quarter of 2025.
The largest contributor to performance over the period was Samsung Electronics, a leading manufacturer of memory and semiconductor chips. In recent years, Samsung’s foundry business has been a major point of investor concern, which culminated in significant losses in the first half of 2025. These losses were exacerbated by one-time charges related to US export controls to China. The company has since undertaken a strategic shift from a “capacity-first” to a “customer-first” model, which appears to be bearing fruit. The shares rose during the quarter, as Samsung continued to benefit from surging AI-related demand for its high-bandwidth memory chips as well as tightness in traditional DRAM demand-supply. Strong results from US chipmaker Micron reinforced expectations of a sustained memory upcycle into 2026. With the turnaround in its foundry business and a strong legacy memory business, we believe the risk-reward looks favourable.
Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp (OCBC) was the second largest contributor. Headquartered in Singapore, OCBC is a high-quality bank with a sensible attitude to risk. It has a strong base in two regional hubs: Singapore – to capture growth in Southeast Asia; and Hong Kong – for the Greater China region. As long-term investors, we like its conservative approach and its focus on growing the wealth management business. Recent earnings results were better than expected, driven by strong fee income as well as rising AUM and fees in its wealth management business.
The third largest contributor to performance was DFI Retail, a leading pan-Asian retailing group with a dominant market position across various segments, including drug stores, supermarkets, convenience stores, IKEA and Maxim’s (a joint venture catering and restaurants business). After years of lacklustre performance, DFI – and the broader Jardine group – has redoubled efforts to grow the business, and to improve operational efficiencies and returns on capital while optimising capital allocation. Improving total shareholder return is the new mantra for the group, and there are now clear signs of improvement. We believe margins could improve still further and lead to underlying profit growth.
On the negative side, Alibaba was the largest detractor from performance. The shares weakened over the last few months of 2025 on concerns about its e-commerce business and the resulting pressure on earnings. Losses from its Taobao Instant Commerce business (food delivery and on-demand retail) weighed on the share price. On the other hand, Alibaba has had a strong run-up over 2025, driven by its investments into AI and growing demand for cloud computing. Alicloud revenue has accelerated in recent quarters and is expected to continue at pace in the coming quarters.
Tube Investments of India was the second biggest detractor, as it reported sluggish business performance and rising competition in the electric vehicle (EV) space. Despite its early mover advantage, Tube has struggled to maintain market share. It plans to arrest these challenges by increasing the number of dealership partners and entering new sub-segments in EV battery packs. On a positive note, the core business is stable with robust returns on capital employed, and it generates healthy free cash flow which is being invested in new businesses with high returns potential. In this endeavour, we are backing the management, particularly Vellayan Subbiah (executive chairman), who has an exceptional track record and has created tremendous value for shareholders.
Sea Ltd was the third largest detractor, as it continued to decline on concerns about margins, given its marketing tactics and promotional spending. Shopee, its e-commerce platform, has expanded its VIP program to Singapore and Taiwan (in addition to Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam), which includes extra cash-back, monthly discount vouchers and free delivery – all for a fixed monthly subscription fee.
Looking forward
We are optimistic on the outlook for Asian equities. With a rising share of global gross domestic product (GDP) growth, Asia should continue to benefit from the shift towards higher value services-led growth, digital transformation and the financial activities across the region. Valuations also look attractive in comparison to developed markets like the US, while low ownership of Asian equities in global portfolios provides a good backdrop for positive returns.
Across the team’s Asian equity portfolios, our core holdings have continued to deliver good underlying business performance and shareholder returns. Current portfolio valuations remain attractive – as they have been over the last couple of years. Looking forward, we expect earnings to grow at low double-digit rates with circa 20% average returns on equity, while companies are generating more cash and returning it to shareholders.
While we can’t second guess when the AI theme might run its course, our holdings are characterised by strong competitive advantages, and they have historically managed to preserve margins and profitability through the cycles. We are confident that their strong fundamentals will translate into attractive shareholder returns in the long run, as the market broadens, over time, from its narrow focus on AI.
FSSA’s approach to sustainability
All SI portfolios will continue to be managed true to label, with due consideration given to SI’s SFDR Article 9 sustainability requirements. Importantly, both FSSA and SI had operated as one team for 27 years (1988-2015) before the decision was made in 2015 to split into two teams. This is heavily reflected in our investment philosophies and processes and our respective approaches to sustainability.
At FSSA, we believe it is everyone’s responsibility to think about sustainability as part of his or her investment decision-making. We don’t use external consultants or environmental, social and governance (ESG) ratings, nor do we outsource the sustainability work to a separate team. In our research, we focus on evaluating the long-term merits of a given investment opportunity. Given that sustainability issues are effectively investment issues, we believe that these challenges and opportunities – and management’s response to them – can have a significant impact on a company’s returns. As such, we look for evidence that the management operates the business effectively and in the interests of all stakeholders – both now and for the longer term.
While issues relating to climate change, or people and communities, are often the ones that get the most attention, most of our company engagements relate to management quality and corporate governance systems, as we believe that good governance is the foundation on which great companies are built. We often engage with management teams on capital allocation and strategy, remuneration structures and succession planning, board diversity and tenure, and ensuring high levels of transparency and company disclosure – to highlight just a few.
For more information on FSSA, or if you have any questions about the transition, please do not hesitate to contact us.
NB Both Stewart Investors and FSSA have been supported by the same centralised Responsible Investment team within the First Sentier Group, who will continue to support FSSA after the transition of SI funds.
Risk factors
Capital at risk. The value of investments and any income from them may go down as well as up and are not guaranteed. Investors may get back significantly less than the original amount invested.
Source for company information: Stewart Investors investment team and company data. This stock information does not constitute any offer or inducement to enter into any investment activity. Portfolio data shown is from representative strategy accounts of the strategy shown above. Named new investments disclosed relate to holdings with a portfolio weight over 0.5%. It is not a recommendation or solicitation to purchase or invest in any fund. Differences between the representative account-specific constraints, currency or fees and those of a similarly managed fund or mandate would affect results.
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Previous Quarterly Shareholder updates:
Q3: 1 July - 30 September 2025
Significant Trust changes
The quarter’s defining characteristic was the extraordinary surge of investment in AI infrastructure. Although AI is often viewed as a US-focused phenomenon, many of its leaders are actually found in Asia rather than America. They include the manufacturers of the advanced semiconductors that supply computing power to data centres, the companies whose technology tests those semiconductors for reliability, and the suppliers of essential components to data centres.
We are aware of the intense geopolitical pressures that surround some of these companies, such as the desire to shift production of semiconductors to the US to keep the most advanced chips out of the hands of America’s perceived enemies. These pressures may influence corporate behaviour in a way that is not to the advantage of long-term shareholders. This is something we are debating and watching closely.
Over the past quarter, the number of companies entering and leaving the Trust’s portfolio remained typically low. We added two new holdings while selling four.
Activity
New holding: AIA (Hong Kong: Financials)
Over the course of more than a century, the life insurer AIA has steadily developed a distinct culture combining a conservative approach to investment with an entrepreneurial structure. Its business is built around a high-quality salesforce who foster long-term relationships with their customers. AIA demands higher levels of professionalisation from its agents than many of its competitors, who often rely on armies of part-time agents. Although this means there have been times when AIA has grown more slowly than its peers, putting the needs of its customers above drive for short-term expansion has enabled it to build a premium brand. It now has an opportunity to grow by fulfilling unmet insurance needs across China, India and Southeast Asia. While those countries are getting richer, they lack social safety nets, making insurance products a necessity. This is especially true in China, where the regulator has recently allowed AIA to expand into new regions beyond its historical areas of strength in Beijing, Shanghai, and the Pearl River Delta.
New holding: Jardine Matheson (Hong Kong: Industrials)
Jardine Matheson is a complicated company whose journey towards greater simplicity and professionalisation has the potential to reward patient investors. The current chairman inherited a sprawling conglomerate whose interests span retail, property, financial services, healthcare, autos, construction equipment, hotels, and mining. His vision is to appoint high-quality professionals to run the company’s various business units, giving them well-defined targets and then granting them autonomy to hit those targets. He keeps a deliberately low profile and acknowledges the missteps the business has made over the past decade. Both are valuable signals of humility. He has sold a number of businesses not viewed as being central to the company’s long-term growth story in a way that would have previously been unthinkable.
Sold: Advantech (Taiwan: Information Technology)
As share prices surged sharply higher across parts of the technology sector, we have trimmed the Trust’s exposure to it by selling the holding in industrial ‘internet-of-things’ company Advantech. Our confidence in its future prospects had faded and the valuation of its shares had begun to appear demanding.
Sold: Tata Communications (India: Communication Services)
Tata Communications is in the midst of a transformation, evolving from a utility company into a technology business partner, offering a range of digital services and solutions to its clients. While profitable, this is also a highly competitive area and our confidence in its future growth has weakened. We can now find stronger ideas – and better homes for the Trust’s capital – elsewhere.
Sold: Tokyo Electron (Japan: Information Technology)
Tokyo Electron sells manufacturing equipment to semiconductor makers such as Samsung Electronics and TSMC. We had become concerned that its share price was too high.
Sold: Zhejiang Supor (China: Consumer Discretionary)
Concerns that a variety of challenges, including weakness in China’s housing market, would overpower satisfying, long-term returns motivated the sale of Zhejiang Supor, a cookware manufacturer with limited growth prospects.
Q2: 1 April - 30 June 2025
Significant Trust changes
Shortly after the quarter began, President Trump announced his ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs. With China responding in kind, the prospect of a sharp contraction in global trade saw markets worldwide – including Asia – falling sharply. Within a matter of days, however, a fall in the US dollar and the threat of a rout in the US government bond market encouraged the president to impose a 90-day pause on imposing most of his tariffs. As the world pulled back from an outright trade war, Asian markets rallied, with the gains being led by markets in the export-dominated economies of South Korea and Taiwan. Given our enthusiasm for a number of India’s high-quality, entrepreneurial companies, we were pleased to see share prices in that country starting to rally off the lows seen earlier in the year. The rally was aided by a cut in interest rates but also, we would argue, by valuations that appear attractive in view of those companies’ long-term growth potential.
Although share prices in some parts of Asia have recovered from the falls seen at the start of the quarter, the on/off discussions on tariffs have undoubtedly created lingering uncertainty. Some of the companies we have met are looking ahead to a potential resumption of talks on trade through the summer. Although we won’t try to predict their outcome, we would note that business leaders are often preparing for the worst while hoping for the best. While the market waits for greater clarity on trade, we continue as usual: seeking high-quality companies to invest in for the long term.
During the quarter we added four new positions to the Trust’s portfolio. Trip.com (China: Consumer Discretionary), a leading online travel agency, is set to benefit from the growth in the number of Chinese tourists travelling both domestically and overseas. Comparable companies in the US and Europe show how attractive the economics of online travel platforms can be. There is a tendency for market leaders in this sector to come to dominate their smaller rivals over time. Sea (Singapore: Communication Services) is the parent company of the pan-Southeast Asian e-commerce retailer Shoppee. It has built a strong presence across the region by offering attractive prices, a wide selection and reliable delivery. We expect it to benefit from the growth of e-commerce within the region, from its expansion into the Brazilian market and by offering credit to Shoppee’s users and merchants.
Motilal Oswal Financial Services (India: Financials) has businesses spanning stockbroking, asset management, wealth management, investment banking, and housing finance. It should benefit from meeting the savings and investment needs of India’s growing middle class. The final purchase of the quarter was SM Investments (Philippines: Industrials), a conglomerate whose businesses span banking, property and retail.
In addition, we continued to add to the Trust’s existing positions in Alibaba (China: Consumer Discretionary) and DFI Retail (Hong Kong: Consumer Staples), reflecting our growing confidence in both companies.
We sold the entirety of the Trust’s holding in Tata Consultancy Services (India: Information Technology) and Dr. Lal PathLabs (India: Health Care) due to their valuations. We sold the holding in Hangzhou Robam (China: Consumer Discretionary) in recognition of the difficulties it faces in selling its kitchen appliances into China’s depressed property market. Our sales of Unicharm (Japan: Consumer Staples) and of its subsidiary Uni-Charm Indonesia (Indonesia: Consumer Staples) reflected the increasing competition the group faces from local brands across Asia. Finally we disposed of small positions in ESAB India (India: Industrials) after struggling to build confidence and in Bajaj Housing Finance (India: Financials) where we struggled to buy enough shares to build a meaningfully sized position.
In recognition of the trade uncertainties and difficult geopolitical situation facing Taiwan, we trimmed the Trust’s holdings there. As part of this, we reduced its holdings in TSMC (Taiwan: Information Technology), MediaTek (Taiwan: Information Technology), Advantech (Taiwan: Information Technology) and Delta Electronics (Taiwan: Information Technology). Our confidence in the underlying quality of these businesses is undimmed but we believe it is prudent to manage the Trust’s overall exposure to the country. Elsewhere, to fund the additions mentioned above, we trimmed Samsung Biologics (South Korea: Health Care), Samsung Electronics (South Korea: Information Technology) and CG Power (India: Industrials).
Predicting how any of today's economic and political challenges will play out lies beyond our remit and our skillset. Fortunately, many of the Asian companies held in the Trust have long memories; they still have the scar tissue formed during previous crises. These businesses have been forced to learn, to adapt and to become resilient. As a result, we believe they are set up not only to perform when conditions are fair but to navigate through whatever political and economic turbulence lies ahead.
Q1: 1 January - 31 March 2025
Significant Trust changes
Broad market indices in the Asia Pacific region moved slightly lower in sterling terms over the first quarter of 2025. Perhaps of greater significance was that political turbulence resulted in a wide divergence of returns on a country level. Market indices in China, South Korea and Singapore moved higher but fell across the rest of the region, with some markets suffering double-digit falls.
Most notable was the extent of the divergence in returns between markets in India (down) and China (up). Investors’ enthusiasm for Chinese equities came in response to DeepSeek’s impressive demonstration of the progress the country is making in AI, some market-friendly rhetoric from the government in Beijing and hopes that the United States’ trade tariffs might not prove too onerous. In contrast, while there was relatively little news from India, share prices there fell back from elevated levels, as they did in many other parts of the world; returns from the Indian market over the quarter were broadly in-line with those from markets in the United States.
During the quarter, and on behalf of the Trust, we added new positions in S.F. Holding (China: Industrials), Mindray (China: Health Care) and Alibaba (China: Consumer Discretionary). S.F. Holding is China’s number one provider of logistics and is well placed to benefit from the growth in time-sensitive logistics across Asia. Mindray is a global leader in affordable medical devices and is steadily climbing up the value chain. Alibaba, meanwhile, has an important part to play amid China’s new emphasis on increasing national self-reliance, particularly in the realms of AI and cloud computing. In recent years, the stewards of Chinese companies have, often for the first time, been tested by genuine economic and political adversity. They have applied the lessons learned, strengthening their franchises and balance sheets. This, in combination with valuations that appear modest by global standards, means we have been identifying a greater number of new investment ideas in China.
Elsewhere, we established new positions in Bank of the Philippine Islands (Philippines: Financials) and BDO Unibank (Philippines: Financials). Both are family owned and professionally managed. In India, we took advantage of recent weakness to add a new holding in Bajaj Auto (India: Consumer Discretionary), a leading manufacturer of motorcycles, scooters and auto rickshaws backed by a high-quality steward.
Lower valuations also prompted us to build the Trust’s positions in two companies which we first purchased last year. Bajaj Holdings & Investment (India: Financials) is a holding company with auto and finance businesses and Sundaram Finance (India: Financials) provides vehicle finance, home loans and general insurance.
We sold the entirety of the Trust’s holding in Tata Consumer Products (India: Consumer Staples) on valuation grounds. We also sold out of Syngene (India: Health Care), Dr. Reddy’s Laboratories (India: Health Care) and Cyient (India: Information Technology) because of their vulnerability to policy changes from the White House. Finally, we sold ICICI Lombard (India: Financials), IndiaMART (India: Industrials) and Koh Young Technology (South Korea: Information Technology). These were small positions and we had better ideas elsewhere.
We continued to reduce the holding in TSMC (Taiwan: Information Technology) as evidence continued to mount that it is losing control of capital expenditure. To control position sizes, we reduced Mahindra & Mahindra (India: Consumer Discretionary), and CG Power (India: Industrials).
As the long period of US exceptionalism draws to an end, we hope investors will begin to pay attention to the abundance of attractively valued companies to be found in the Asia Pacific region. Clearly, if the US economy falters and global demand falls, then economies across Asia will be impacted, albeit to differing degrees. We are also conscious that political risks appear to be rising in many Asian countries. Those risks, however, are far from uniform. The region’s technology complex, centred around Taiwan, South Korea and China, would appear to be particularly vulnerable to a global slowdown. India, by contrast, remains a domestically driven growth story and, as such, is somewhat isolated from the tumult in the global economy. The Philippines, meanwhile, could receive a significant economic boost if a global slowdown results in a meaningful fall in oil prices.
Predicting how any of today’s economic and geopolitical challenges will play out lies beyond our remit and our skillset. Fortunately, many of the Asian companies held in the Trust have long memories; they still have the scar tissue formed during previous crises. These businesses have been forced to learn, to adapt and to become resilient. As a result, we believe they are set up not only to perform when conditions are fair but to navigate through whatever political and economic turbulence lies ahead.
Risk factors
This web page is a financial promotion for Pacific Assets Trust plc (the “Trust”) only for those people resident in the UK and Ireland for tax and investment purposes.
Investing involves certain risks including:
- The value of investments and any income from them may go down as well as up and are not guaranteed. Investors may get back significantly less than the original amount invested.
- Emerging market risk: emerging markets tend to be more sensitive to economic and political conditions than developed markets. Other factors include greater liquidity risk, restrictions on investment or transfer of assets, failed/delayed settlement and difficulties valuing securities.
- Specific region risk: investing in a specific region may be riskier than investing in a number of different countries or regions. Investing in a larger number of countries or regions helps spread risk.
- Currency risk: the Trust invests in assets which are denominated in other currencies; changes in exchange rates will affect the value of the Trust and could create losses. Currency control decisions made by governments could affect the value of the Trust’s investments.
- The Trust’s share price may not fully reflect its net asset value.
Where featured, specific securities or companies are intended as an illustration of investment strategy only, and should not be construed as investment advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security.
For an overview of the terms of investment, risks, returns, costs and charges please refer to the Key Information Document.
If you are in any doubt as to the suitability of the Trust for your investment needs, please seek investment advice.
