Neuberger Berman Group has launched the Neuberger Berman Greater China Equity Fund, a mutual fund for US investors investing primarily in equity securities of issuers based in mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau.
The fund is managed by a team of 13, including portfolio managers and strategists, research analysts and traders, which is based in Shanghai and Hong Kong and has an average of 14 years of experience investing in Greater China markets.
Led by portfolio managers and managing directors Yulin (Frank) Yao and Lihui Tang, the fund seeks to achieve an attractive total return by investing in typically 30 to 50 large- and mid-cap equity securities primarily in the Greater China region, which represents one of the world’s fastest-growing measured by GDP and is the world’s second-largest equity market by market capitalisation. The fund’s investment team employs a bottom-up, research-driven style with a value bias and has the latitude to invest in securities not found in the fund’s index, the MSCI China index.
Under the leadership of Yao, the fund’s investment team currently manages over USD1.7bn for institutional and individual investors in other vehicles at Neuberger Berman, along with a number of private funds and managed accounts ranging from dedicated China A-shares to broader Greater China equities.
According to Yao, who serves additionally as Neuberger Berman’s vice chairman for Asia-Pacific, the Greater China region is a large and inefficient market with compelling investment opportunities for US investors. The fund’s team is focused on two broad themes where it believes domestic demand will benefit from economic growth – consumption-driven sectors, including agriculture, autos, entertainment, food and beverage, healthcare and retail, and infrastructure, including equipment, machinery and utilities.
"We believe valuations for domestic and overseas-listed Chinese equities are at their lowest point in recent years, at roughly half their historical averages, and we think this is a great time for US investors with a longer-term outlook to consider investing in the Greater China region," Yao says.
