Matthews Asia has announced the expansion of its Luxembourg-domiciled UCITS fund range with the launch of the Matthews Japan fund.
It seeks to generate long-term capital appreciation by investing in the Japanese equity markets.
The fund seeks to achieve its objective by investing in an all-cap portfolio of Japanese companies, many of which are positioned to benefit from growth opportunities in Asia or the improvement in the corporate governance and domestic growth outlook inside Japan.
The Matthews Japan strategy has been available to investors in the US since 1998.
The UCITS fund will follow the same bottom-up, fundamental investment approach and is managed by the same Lead Portfolio Manager, Kenichi Amaki, who is supported by Co-Manager Taizo Ishida and the broader Matthews Asia 40-member investment team.
Kenichi Amaki, lead manager commented: “Japan has been seen by many investors as a ‘large-cap value’ market over the past 15 years, but we view Japan as a long-term, core investment opportunity and, as such, we invest across the market-cap spectrum.
“The portfolio includes lesser-known small-cap companies with strong and sustainable growing domestic businesses relative to many large-cap peers. We also look at Japan in a regional context, paying particular attention to firms that are poised to benefit from the rising income levels in the region and that are tied into the growth of the Asian household.“
Jonathan Schuman, head of Global Business Development adds: “We believe that this is an opportune time for global investors to re-engage with Japan as a strategic portion of their portfolios. Japanese companies are increasingly benefitting from rising levels of income growth and improving productivity levels across Asia.
“The integration of Japan with Asia’s broader economy is a key reason why we are excited about investment opportunities in the Japanese equity market. The addition of the Matthews Japan Fund to our Luxembourg funds platform reflects Matthews Asia’s strategic commitment to delivering our specialist capabilities to retail and institutional investors globally.”