Alternatives to big Asia Pac funds

Following a raft of closures of top GEM funds, the next region to see a number of closures seems to be the Asia Pacific region, with at least one top Aberdeen executive providing guidance that the fund’s closure will come ‘sooner rather than later’, while another Aberdeen vet was quoted saying, ‘we wouldn’t be keen on having US$5b flood through the door’.

I like how Hugh Young probably evokes envy and annoyance by speaking plainly. Many an Asia Pacific and Asia Pacific ex-Japan equity fund love a US$5b flood like a desert in search of a fire hose. But investors, oh fickle souls they are, will tend to seek funds with the potential to turn their bucket of liquidity into a monetary oasis, from which springs forth the fruits of no labour. Or so they hope.

Besides, I could use a little practice with new software.

Pulling up a list of funds sold in Singapore, with a minimum 5-year track record and focused on the Asia Pacific/Asia Pacific ex-Japan region, I rank them based on their calmar ratio.

Not to be confused with the calamari ratio: the ratio of sauce to squid. 

Cal-what? Good question, prior to writing this article, your humble writer had no clue either.

The calmar ratio divides the average compounded return (of at least 36 months) by the maximum drawdown over the same period. I like it because it’s simpler than the Sharpe ratio, and the calmar ratio doesn’t muck about with nefariously misunderstood terms like volatility.

So from end-May 2013 to end-May 2008, the top 20 funds ranked by calmar are:

5/31/2008 to 5/31/2013	Calmar ratio
Name
Schroder ISF Asian Total Return A Acc	0.29
Value Partners High-Dividend Stocks Fund A1	0.22
CAM-GTF Ltd	0.20
First State Asian Equity Plus I (Distributing)	0.17
First State Dividend Advantage SGD	0.16
Aberdeen Pacific Equity SGD	0.15
Lumiere Value	0.14
First State Asian Growth I Accumulation USD	0.14
Schroder Asian Growth SGD	0.14
First State Asian Growth SGD	0.13
Legg Mason WA Southeast Asia Special Sits Trust	0.12
Aberdeen Global - Asia Pacific Eqty A2 USD	0.10
Old Mutual Pacific Equity A USD	0.10
Henderson HF Asian Dividend Income A2 USD	0.10
Schroder ISF Asian Equity Yield A Acc	0.09
Schroder Asian Equity Yield A	0.09
Barclays GA - Pacific Rim (ex-Japan) M Inc	0.09
Fidelity Funds - Asia Pacific Dividend A-USD	0.08
Invesco Pacific Equity A	0.08
Schroder ISF Asian Opportunities A Acc	0.08

Now, bearing in mind this is nothing more than a ranked list based on a ranking criterion selected more for simplicity than convention, there are obvious limitations to what you can draw from the list.

But safe to say, there are options.