Private equity avoids bumper ride
Alternative Investments
Winner
Partners Group Global Value Fund
Finalists
Aspect Diversified Futures
AQR Wholesale Managed Futures Fund – Class 1P
The Partners Group Global Value Fund is a private equity fund that aims to provide investors with diversification while protecting them from market volatility.
Partners Group partner, Martin Scott, said that while equity is equity whether one invests in private and public markets, the greatest benefit of public equity is it has daily pricing and valuations.
"But that also leaves you open to market sentiment volatility where you see big swings on market events like Brexit or terrorism.
"However, one of the big benefits in this portfolio in private equity is it is very much earnings-based," Scott said, adding the fund invests in companies that are at the smaller end of the market where there is not as much competition.
With over 1,000 companies in the fund, the firm seeks to achieve a 10 per cent net return for investors by either investing in equity or debt.
Aspect Diversified Futures has flourished on the back of being built around managed futures and capturing trends over a period of two to three months or longer in an entirely systematic fashion, chief executive and co-founder, Anthony Todd said.
"The program that we run has generated a growth of eight per cent last year. We're up again so far this year for systematically capturing momentum in liquid futures markets worldwide where we trade seven market sectors including stock indices, metals, and agricultural," Todd said, adding the fund was short on crude oil, natural gas, and the industrial metal markets.
Exhibiting a negative correlation to equity markets when it suffered large downturns worked for AQR Wholesale Managed Futures Fund - Class 1P, the other finalist in the category.
"Fund pursues a trend-following strategy across equities, fixed income, commodities and currencies, which we believe can offer investors a unique and differentiated return profile relative to traditional and even other alternative strategies," portfolio manager, Yao Hua Ooi, said.
AUTHOR
Malavika Santhebennur
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