Perpetual concentrates on wholesale

In a further sign of specialisation towards a market segment Perpetual Investments has rolled out a fund focusing on a small number of shares.

In a further sign of specialisation towards a market segment Perpetual Investments has rolled out a fund focusing on a small number of shares.

The Wholesale Concentrated Equity fund is pitched at institutional and wholesale investors aiming for long term capital growth and income by investing in 50 com-panies or less at any time.

Perpetual Investment chief executive Rodney Green says the fund has a target of holding about 40 stocks and follows the launch of a similar institutional product 18 months ago.

“Due to the smaller number of holdings in the fund, returns may have a higher de-gree of volatility than funds with a more diversified portfolio, but it is also more likely to provide higher returns,” Green says.

“All of our funds meet the same selection criteria of conservative debt levels, sound management, quality of business, and in the case of industrial companies, recurring earnings,” he says.

Minimum initial investment in the fund is $100,000.

“The fund should appeal to more sophisticated investors who understand the nature of investing, they will be more likely to accept a higher volatility in return for po-tentially greater performance.”

The fund may also be rolled out to retail investors dependent on demand and up-take while in its present form interest has been high from master funds. Ten insti-tutional investors having already entered into the fund.

The fund will also shy away from technology and telecommunications stocks. Fund manager John Sevior saying Perpetual has exposure to these stocks already via other avenues.

"We tend not to go for new economy stocks outright but rather those stocks which participate in the new economy but still maintain a rump in a stable and performing

business," Sevior says.