Property & Infrastructure Securities
Winner
Magellan Infrastructure Fund (Unhedged)
Finalists
Resolution Capital Global Property Securities Fund
Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure Fund
Knowing what not to invest it has helped the Magellan Infrastructure Fund (unhedged) take out Money Management/ Lonsec’s Property and Infrastructure Securities award.
The fund’s philosophy is the view that when people invest in infrastructure they are not necessarily expecting to shoot the lights out but they have an expectation that they are going to get reliable returns and bank on those returns, according to portfolio manager, Gerald Stack.
“We screen out things that are influenced by commodity price, competition, and sovereign risk. We have around about 200 stocks in them, of those, you can get 130 to 140 stocks that meet our criteria,” he said.
“The main challenge is to stick to our process and we have a very disciplined way we define what infrastructure is,” Stack said.
“It means that sometimes some of the things that look attractive might not meet our definition so there’s a requirement to stick and apply to that definition with discipline.”
Stack also said the other main challenge for the fund was to understand where the macro environment was going next and to try and “think around corners about what may be coming”.
Resolution Capital’s managing director, Andrew Parsons, cited simplicity the reason for success for its Capital Global Property Securities Fund.
“We’ve been delivering something that people have been asking for high quality exposure real estate around the world and we’ve been pretty straightforward in our goal and objective with a concentrated portfolio with less than 50 of world’s best real estate stocks,” Parsons said.
“In a high conviction approach the main challenge is to stay disciplined when markets aren’t going your way, staying true to label and be confident in what you’ve got investments in can carry through the rough times and come out the other end in much better shape for investors.”
Finalist Lazard Global Listed Infrastructure Fund also said discipline and the tenure of the team was a key factor in its success.
“We invest money through a consistent framework for investors and have a strict adherence to preferred infrastructure. These are the assets that produced a stable and consistent pattern of returns year in and year out, the fund’s portfolio manager, Warryn Robertson said.
