Asset Allocation & Fund Positioning, Copley Fund Research

Steven Holden

Steven Holden is the CEO and Founder of Copley Fund Research, an independent provider of research on equity fund positioning and performance.  Set up in 2014, Copley focuses on global, global emerging market, US, Asia Ex-Japan and China active equity funds, covering over $4tr in assets across 1300 active managers.  The company provides data and analysis on market trends, manager exposures and active fund performance to an audience of investment managers, pension funds and fund selectors worldwide.  Mr Holden’s 14-year investment banking career started in 2000, where he worked for Morgan Stanley as an equity derivative trader focused on emerging markets in London.  Following this, he spent 4 years at Citibank in London and Hong Kong as an Executive Director in derivative sales, focused again on emerging markets.

Asset Allocation & Fund Positioning

China Longyuan (916 HK): Running Out Of Puff?

China Longyuan (916 HK): Things Aren't that Bad

China Longyuan (916 HK): Record-Breaking Jan, and Strategically Positioned for the Long Term

China New and Clean Energy: A-Share IPO Pipeline Gathering Pace

Copley Fund Research

Copley Fund Research provide research and data on asset allocation among Global and Emerging Market equity funds.  The analysis details absolute and relative positioning across countries, sectors and industries together with highly granular data on single stock and single fund allocations.  The data is updated monthly with time series going back to January 2011.

Global Research - Analysis of 165 prominent Global equity funds, combined AUM $335bn
GEM Research - Analysis of 127 prominent global EM equity funds, combined AUM $250bn

Asset Allocation - Global and GEM Equity

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

Kenya Utilities / Thematic (Sector/Industry)

Utilities are the smallest sector allocation among global EM managers.  Average weights stand at 1.45%, or underweight -0.41% versus the <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/ishares-msci-emerging-markets" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:438:1" rel="noopener">iShares MSCI Emerging Markets (EEM US)</a> portfolio.  Only 66.8% of the EM funds in our analysis have any exposure at all, with 29.5% positioned as overweight.<a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/enn-energy-holdings-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:316:1" rel="noopener">ENN Energy (2688 HK)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/china-longyuan-power-group-corp-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:14215:1" rel="noopener">China Longyuan Power Group Corp (916 HK)</a> are the few brightspots in an otherwise very lightly held sector.With continued underperformance of the MSCI EM Utilities sector, a weight in the benchmark MSCI Emerging Markets index of sub 2% and an average active fund weight of 1.45%, EM managers must question whether Utilities stocks have a place in EM portfolios at all.

Utilities are the smallest sector allocation among global EM managers.  Average weights stand at 1.45%, or underweight -0.41% versus the iShares MSCI Emerging Markets (EEM US) portfolio.  Only 66.8% of the EM funds in our analysis have any exposure at all, with 29.5% positioned as overweight.ENN Energy (2688 HK) and China Longyuan Power Group Corp (916 HK) are the few brightspots in an otherwise very lightly held sector.With continued underperformance of the MSCI EM Utilities sector, a weight in the benchmark MSCI Emerging Markets index of sub 2% and an average active fund weight of 1.45%, EM managers must question whether Utilities stocks have a place in EM portfolios at all.

EM Utilities: Bailing Out