Fund of the week: sector-beating Asian performance

The Schroder Asian Alpha Plus fund has been the top perfomer in its sector over the last year, gaining 76.6% against an average 52.8% return for funds in the IMA Asia Pacific Excluding Japan group. Managed by Matthew Dobbs since its launch in November 2007, the fund focuses on maximising capital growth by investing in Asia-ex-Japan companies. "My style is towards the quality end of companies, seeking out areas such as the mispricing of growth," says Dobbs in Investment Week. "Disciplined portfolio construction is important. Any new stock in means an old stock goes out. So at all times I am thinking about optimising the effectiveness of the capital pot in the fund."

As of January, there were 61 holdings in the portfolio, mainly equities including real-estate investment trusts. However, the mandate is broad and allows Dobbs to invest in bonds and make use of higher-risk tools such as derivatives, warrants and unregulated collective investment schemes. Some successful picks over the past year include Indonesian coal companies "which turned out to be very good value" and opting for Chinese exporters when the rest of the market was focusing on domestic Chinese firms. Investing in Korea's LG Chemicals and Taiwanese shipping firm Wan Hai Lines was also a good move, as these "survivors in the export sectors were doing extremely well with other firms having gone bust".

Currently, the fund is overweight industrials and IT, while Dobbs has been adding property stocks, mainly in Hong Kong and China. He admits that a couple of months ago he was cautious about recommending people invest in the region as he felt things "could tail off", but with markets falling back, "I think it is definitely time to be putting a bit of money in".

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Schroder Asian Alpha Plus Fund top ten holdings