FE

SVM UK Growth

Financial hieroglyphics

Ignis Asset Management has converted its £1.2bn UK Property fund into a Property Authorised Investment Fund (PAIF) in a bid to offer investors a tax-efficient way to access the vehicle.

The average strategic bond fund now holds less than half its assets in the UK, as managers "starved" of opportunities rotate into Europe, the US, and emerging market debt.

Boutique investment house Newscape Capital Group has closed its poorly-performing Dynamic Rates & Currency fund less than two years after bringing it to market, and has also shut its Absolute Bond fund, Investment Week understands.

Baring Asset Management is to shut its Corporate Bond fund on 2 May following several years of poor performance and a series of large redemptions, Investment Week can reveal.

FUND MANAGER FOCUS

Although water shortages are most prominent in emerging markets, the manager of the Pictet Water fund has identified abundant investment opportunities in developed countries due to limited infrastructure.

Investors have been selling out of Russian equities since the country's stand-off with neighbour Ukraine escalated in early March and caused shares to plunge, but one fund manager has been buying back in despite ongoing tensions.

ONE TO WATCH