Bangkok--18 Jan--Manulife
Manulife Asset Management (Thailand) Co., Ltd. starts the new Year of the Dragon with a double-bill of good news. The company today announces that it has appointed Mr. Tor Indhavivadha as Chief Executive Officer. An industry veteran with more than 20 years experience in the Thai market, Tor joins Manulife Asset Management following a 10 year career at ING Funds (Thailand) Co Ltd, latterly as Head of Sales and Distribution.
The company also announces that it is to IPO a brand new fund in Thailand: the Manulife Strength-Asian Small Cap Equity FIF (MS-ASIAN SM). MS-ASIAN SM is a feeder fund investing in Manulife Global Fund-Asian Small Cap Equity Fund (Share Class I), the Master Fund, which focuses on equities of small capitalisation companies in the Asian and/or Pacific region. The fund’s IPO period starts on January 18 and runs until January 27, 2012.
Tor said: “This is an exciting time to be joining Manulife Asset Management (Thailand), a company which I believe has great growth potential in the Thai market. Manulife Asset Management has investment professionals in 10 markets across Asia who feed local expertise in to funds such as the Manulife Strength-Asian Small Cap Equity FIF (MS-ASIAN SM) which we are launching today. We believe that, thanks to this local insight, we can offer our customers the opportunity to tap into the investment potential of Asia’s smaller companies, many of which may go unnoticed by investment houses who don’t have our depth of local expertise. By offering a variety of products such as these, I believe we can continue to grow our business successfully in Thailand.”
Launching the fund in Bangkok, Linda Csellak, Head of Asia Pacific Equities at Manulife Asset Management explained; “The Fund uses a bottom-up strategy for stock selection in order to identify stocks that have growth potential, are at the early stages of a company’s growth, and are under-researched by the brokerage community and therefore under-priced. At this stage, we would consider buying these stocks. By the time they become larger companies, or well-known by mainstream investors, small caps have probably achieved a lot of the upside and are of less interest to us. By focusing on small cap “hidden gems”, we believe we have the potential to deliver outperformance for our clients.”
Explaining the background to this launch, Tor said: “Despite a challenging economic environment in both the US and Europe, many Asian countries remain strong and continue to deliver sound economic growth. Asian small caps have shown strong earnings growth, and very compelling and attractive valuations relative to large caps. In addition, they have outperformed large cap equities in most investment environments over the last 10 years1. Therefore, we see this as an opportune time to launch this FIF fund to provide an alternative investment solution for investors who seek to diversify their investment exposures in Asian Small Cap equities.”
IPO Promotion
For every investment amount of THB 1 million, investors will receive Central Gift Voucher valued at THB 1,500 or the investment units of MS-INCOME of equivalent value (under the same conditions). Terms and conditions apply. For more information, please call Manulife AM (Thailand) Tel. 0-2354-1001 or one of our selling agents: More information, please call Manulife AM (Thailand) Tel. 0-2354-1001 or our selling agents: Citibank N.A. (Thailand) Tel. 0-2788-3335, Merchant Partners Securities Pcl. Tel. 0-2660-6666, Phatra Securities Pcl. Tel. 0-2305-9559, Asia Plus Securities Pcl. Tel.0-2680-1234, KGI Securities (Thailand) Pcl. Tel. 0-2658-8888, Capital Nomura Securities Pcl. Tel. 0-2638-5500 or Phillip Securities (Thailand) Pcl. Tel. 2635-1700.
About Manulife Asset Management (Thailand)
Manulife Asset Management (Thailand) Co., Ltd. is a subsidiary of Manulife Financial Corporation, a leading Canada-based financial services group and one of the largest life insurance companies in the world. As a part of a global investment organization with more than 275 investment professionals around the world and in 10 countries and territories throughout Asia, we are fully supported by and interconnected with Manulife Asset Management’s team worldwide. We are one of only a few asset management companies in Thailand that have expertise in off-shore fund management. This is the strength of Manulife Asset Management (Thailand).
Find out more:
Manulife Asset Management (Thailand) Company Limited
364/30 Sri Ayudhya Road, Rajthevi, Bangkok 10400
Website: www.manulife-asset.co.th Telephone: 02.354-1002 or 02.246.7650 press 2 Facsimile: 02.642.6341
About Manulife Asset Management
Manulife Asset Management is the global asset management arm of Manulife Financial. Manulife Asset Management provides comprehensive asset management solutions for institutional investors and investment funds in key markets around the world. Manulife Asset Management also provides investment management services to affiliates’ retail clients through product offerings of Manulife and John Hancock. This investment expertise extends across a broad range of asset classes including equity, fixed income and alternative investments such as real estate, timber, farmland, as well as asset allocation strategies.
Manulife Asset Management has offices with full investment capabilities in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines. In addition, it has a joint venture asset management business in China, Manulife TEDA. It also has operations in Australia, New Zealand, Brazil and Uruguay. John Hancock Asset Management, Hancock Natural Resource Group and Declaration Management and Research are units of Manulife Asset Management.
As at September 30, 2011, assets under management were Cdn$207 billion (US$199 billion). Additional information about Manulife Asset Management can be found at ManulifeAM.com.
About Manulife Financial
Manulife Financial is a leading Canada-based financial services group operating in 21 countries and territories worldwide. In 2012, we celebrate 125 years of providing clients strong, reliable, trustworthy and forward-thinking solutions for their most significant financial decisions. Our international network of employees, agents and distribution partners offers financial protection and wealth management products and services to millions of clients. We provide asset management services to institutional customers worldwide as well as reinsurance solutions, specializing in property and casualty retrocession. Funds under management by Manulife Financial and its subsidiaries were C$492 billion (US$473 billion) as at September 30, 2011. The Company operates as Manulife Financial in Canada and Asia and primarily as John Hancock in the United States.
Manulife Financial Corporation trades as ‘MFC’ on the TSX, NYSE and PSE, and under ‘945’ on the SEHK. Manulife Financial can be found on the Internet at manulife.com.