Pendal MidCap is an Managed Funds investment product that is benchmarked against ASX Index Small Ordinaries Index and sits inside the Domestic Equity - Small Cap Index. Think of a benchmark as a standard where investment performance can be measured. Typically, market indices like the ASX200 and market-segment stock indexes are used for this purpose. The Pendal MidCap has Assets Under Management of 523.92 M with a management fee of 0.9%, a performance fee of 0.00% and a buy/sell spread fee of 0.9%.
The recent investment performance of the investment product shows that the Pendal MidCap has returned 1.46% in the last month. The previous three years have returned 3.98% annualised and 15.55% each year since inception, which is when the Pendal MidCap first started.
There are many ways that the risk of an investment product can be measured, and each measurement provides a different insight into the risk present. They can be used on their own or together to perform a risk assessment before investing, but when comparing investments, it is common to compare like for like risk measurements to determine which investment holds the most risk. Since Pendal MidCap first started, the Sharpe ratio is NA with an annualised volatility of 15.55%. The maximum drawdown of the investment product in the last 12 months is -10.89% and -32.96% since inception. The maximum drawdown is defined as the high-to-low decline of an investment during a particular time period.
Relative performance is what an asset achieves over a period of time compared to similar investments or its peers. Relative return is a measure of the asset's performance compared to the return to the other investment. The Pendal MidCap has a 12-month excess return when compared to the Domestic Equity - Small Cap Index of -4.77% and 1.17% since inception.
Alpha is an investing term used to measure an investment's outperformance relative to a market benchmark or peer investment. Alpha describes the excess return generated when compared to peer investment. Pendal MidCap has produced Alpha over the Domestic Equity - Small Cap Index of NA% in the last 12 months and NA% since inception.
For a full list of investment products in the Domestic Equity - Small Cap Index category, you can click here for the Peer Investment Report.
Pendal MidCap has a correlation coefficient of 0.95 and a beta of 1.06 when compared to the Domestic Equity - Small Cap Index. Correlation measures how similarly two investments move in relation to one another. This establishes a 'correlation coefficient', which has a value between -1.0 and +1.0. A 100% correlation between two investments means that the correlation coefficient is +1. Beta in investments measures how much the price moves relative to the broader market over a period of time. If the investment moves more than the broader market, it has a beta above 1.0. If it moves less than the broader market, then the beta is less than 1.0. Investments with a high beta tend to carry more risk but have the potential to deliver higher returns.
For a full quantitative report on Pendal MidCap and its peer investments, you can click here for the Peer Investment Report.
For a full quantitative report on Pendal MidCap compared to the ASX Index Small Ordinaries Index, you can click here.
To sort and compare the Pendal MidCap financial metrics, please refer to the table above.
This investment product is in the process of being independently verified by SMSF Mate. Once we have verified the investment product, you will be able to find more information here.
SMSF Mate does not receive commissions or kickbacks from the Pendal MidCap. All data and commentary for this fund is provided free of charge for our readers general information.
The equity market gave up much of its July rally over the first half of August.
However a softer-than-expected CPI inflation print in Australia, coupled with several US indicators that eased some concerns about excessive economic growth, saw some of the concern around further rate hikes recede.
Equities rebounded into the month’s end as a result. The S&P/ASX 51-150 ended down -1.36% for August.
A recent softer-than-expected US employment report is seen as supporting the view that the Fed does not need to hike rates again.
The market is now pricing in a 94% chance that Fed holds rates steady in September and 65% chance of a hold in November too.
The consensus view is firmly that of a soft landing, goldilocks scenario playing out in the US.
Australian earnings season was largely in-line with expectations with earnings revisions no larger than normal. It painted a picture of an economy that remains in good shape with very little evidence of slowdown.
Broadly speaking, cyclicals generally performed better than defensives. In some instances, the former’s earnings declined but held up better than the market feared.
There tended to be larger dispersion within sectors than across them. This indicates a market where stock specifics are exerting a great influence on performance than was the case twelve months ago.
Communication Services (+6.77%) was the best performing sector with good performance from online classified stocks CarSales.Com (CAR, +15.61%) and REA Group (REA, +5.32%)
Energy (+2.47%) also did relatively well, driven mainly by fuel refiner and distributor Ampol (ALD, +7.46%), coal miner New Hope (NHC, +6.03%) and uranium miner Paladin Energy (PDN, +14.97%)
Utilties (-7.13%) fell as AGL Energy (AGL, -7.13%) returned some of the recent strong gains it has made on the back of higher elecrticty prices.
Information Technology (-6.27%) fell as Wisetech (WTC, -18.99%), the largest stock in the sector, flagged that FY24 margins would be below consensus estimates due to the need to invest in in a new product portfolio.
The portfolio outperformed the index in August.
July 2023 was a strong month for emerging market equities. The MSCI EM index returned 4.9% in AUD terms, with strong gains from some major groups of stocks. Chinese internet names performed well, including some key portfolio holdings; some emerging market banks rose strongly, including portfolio holdings in Mexico and South Africa. Turkish (not held) stocks rose strongly on hopes for more orthodox economic policies.
By far, the most substantial gains, though, were in parts of the broader technology sector, particularly stocks with exposure to electric vehicles/batteries and stocks that are possible artificial intelligence beneficiaries. We see multiple signs that there may be excessive optimism in some of these groups of stocks. We are neither taking a view on particular companies/business models nor saying that these upward moves are finished, but we are highlighting some of the market dynamics we see:
1. Huge volumes and parabolic price moves driven by retail investors: this has particularly been the case with the Korean EV/battery sector. EV/battery stocks represented nearly half of the total Korean stock market turnover on some days in July, driven by retail investor leverage rising to a record KRW (South Korean won) 10trn. The key to stock selection has been the Korean YouTube presenter Park Soon-hyeok, better known as ‘Mr. Battery’. Six of his eight recommended names rose over 40% in the month, with the strongest of them, Ecopro (not held), up 1,059% year-to-date. There has also been a raft of new issuance of Korean EV/battery ETFs in recent weeks.
2. Strongest moves in names that might have quality challenges: Strongest moves in names that might have quality challenges: New Oriental Education (China, online education, not held) has previously been the subject of both short-seller allegations of dishonesty and also of the crackdown on online education by the Chinese government. The stock returned 49.8% in July. NIO (China, EV, not held) is forecast by consensus estimates to have a net loss of USD 2bn on USD 8.9bn of sales this year but rose 58% in July, underperforming XPeng (China, EV, not held), expected to lose USD 1.2bn on USD 4.5bn of sales, and up 74% in July. In May of this year, Lee Dong-chae, the chairman and largest shareholder of Ecopro, was sentenced to two years in prison for violating South Korean capital market laws.
3. Parabolic moves in stocks that aren’t pure play tech names: Posco Holdings (Korea, steel, not held) is one of Asia’s largest steel producers, with thirty thousand employees producing 32 million tons of steel every year. The company has made some smart investments in green steel technology and has ongoing investments in EV battery components, which it provided an update on in July. That update was material in driving the market cap of Posco Holdings from USD 24.9bn to USD 42.5bn in the month. Similarly, strong monthly gains (+50%) were seen in some Taiwanese PC and laptop producers that have been reporting declining PC, laptop and server volumes this year, on the hope that AI server orders (volumes and margins at this point unclear) are about to follow.
4. Crucially, the high-quality large-cap companies with proven track records and technologies were laggards in the month. TSMC (Taiwan, tech hardware, held) is widely recognised as the world’s dominant producer of high-performance semiconductors that are key to AI; the stock fell 2.8% in July. Samsung Electronics (Korea, tech hardware, held) is TSMC’s nearest challenger in highend semiconductors and a major producer of computer memory, including the HBM type used in AI servers; the stock fell -0.4% in July. The technological revolutions in AI and EV are changing the world, but equity markets will not price that opportunity with perfect efficiency. We are concerned that some parts of the EM equity space look particularly inefficient right now.
One of the strongest arguments for employing a top-down, country-level approach to EM equity investing (as we do) is the role of currencies in returns and the variance of returns. Emerging market currencies are typically more volatile than developed market currencies, but in addition, currency moves in emerging markets are typically correlated with equity market moves and with economic conditions.
This approach has worked well in the first half of 2023, with some major emerging markets (from the higher beta, more US dollarsensitive end of the spectrum) seeing strong returns in both currencies and equities. For example, MSCI Mexico returned 11.6% in MXN terms, while the Mexican peso appreciated by 13.9% against the US dollar, lifting USD returns for the index to 27.1%. Brazil and Indonesia enjoyed similar return patterns in the first half of the year.
There have been a number of drivers of this currency support for equity returns, and we believe that these are likely to persist in the second half of 2023, lifting our confidence in the markets our portfolio is overweight.
Firstly, conditions for the US dollar. Exchange rates are just ratios, and the fundamentals of the US dollar have not been supportive this year. 2021 and 2022 saw dramatic strength in the US dollar relative to key trade-partner currencies, lifting the real effective exchange rate to a thirty-year high. This represented an overshoot relative to the commodity terms of trade, which turned into negative momentum in late 2022 and the first half of 2023. With a more uncertain outlook, the Federal Reserve may be hiking or cutting interest rates in the second half of 2023 in H2, but the interest rate outlook seems less hawkish than other global central banks.
Secondly, and following on from that, many emerging market central banks, including in Mexico and Brazil, had hiked much earlier and far more aggressively than developed market central banks. Policymakers in these countries have remained cautious despite clear disinflation in their economies – ex-ante real interest rates in Brazil are approaching 9%. Other central banks, for example, in India and Indonesia, have chosen to deploy excess foreign exchange reserves to support their currencies but have avoided the accommodation of inflation that we have seen in many developed markets.
Combining these, we have seen strong conditions for carry trade investors funding in US dollars and investing in emerging market rates and bond markets. As those flows have stabilised currency volatility, risk-adjusted carry returns have steadily improved. A JP Morgan index of one month volatility in emerging market currencies peaked at 20% during the Covid sell-off, averaged 11.3% in 2022, but declined to 8% in June 2023. Volatility adjusted carry still looks attractive relative to history.
Lastly, the trade fundamentals, both in terms of prices (terms of trade) and goods flows (trade balances), look extremely supportive. Trade balances and current account balances look strong relative to history in Brazil, India and Indonesia, while the Mexican trade deficit is offset by inbound remittances from overseas Mexican workers. In all four countries, strong economic and domestic demand growth will inevitably lead to rising imports, but the starting position remains attractive after weak domestic demand growth in the 2010s and the powerful sell-off in real effective exchange rates in 2020.
For these emerging economies, we see attractive economic conditions and strong commitments to monetary orthodoxy attracting increasing capital flows from global carry-trade investors. Those flows further drive liquidity and growth while stabilising and strengthening currencies, all of which are highly supportive for equity investors. We remain highly positive on the outlook for these markets in the second half of the year.
This Fund is designed for investors who want the potential for long term capital growth and tax effective income from a portfolio of primarily 40-60 Australian mid cap shares and are prepared to accept higher variability of returns.
Pendal defines the mid cap universe to include companies ranked between 51 and 150 of the S&P/ASX 200 Index. The Fund may also invest in equivalent companies listed on the New Zealand Stock Exchange, hold cash and may use derivatives. Pendal’s investment process for Australian shares is based on our core investment style and aims to add value through active stock selection and fundamental company research. Pendal’s core investment style is to select stocks based on our assessment of their long term worth and ability to outperform the market, without being restricted by a growth or value bias. Our fundamental company research focuses on valuation, franchise, management quality and risk factors (both financial and non-financial risk).
This Fund is designed for investors who want the potential for long term capital growth and tax effective income from a portfolio of primarily 40-60 Australian mid cap shares and are prepared to accept higher variability of returns. Pendal defines the mid cap universe to include companies ranked between 51 and 150 of the S&P/ASX 200 Index. The Fund may also invest in equivalent companies listed on the New Zealand Stock Exchange, hold cash and may use derivatives. Pendal’s investment process for Australian shares is based on our core investment style and aims to add value through active stock selection and fundamental company research. Pendal’s core investment style is to select stocks based on our assessment of their long term worth and ability to outperform the market, without being restricted by a growth or value bias. Our fundamental company research focuses on valuation, franchise, management quality and risk factors (both financial and non-financial risk).
This Fund is designed for investors who want the potential for long term capital growth and tax effective income from a portfolio of primarily 40-60 Australian mid cap shares and are prepared to accept higher variability of returns. Pendal defines the mid cap universe to include companies ranked between 51 and 150 of the S&P/ASX 200 Index. The Fund may also invest in equivalent companies listed on the New Zealand Stock Exchange, hold cash and may use derivatives. Pendal’s investment process for Australian shares is based on our core investment style and aims to add value through active stock selection and fundamental company research. Pendal’s core investment style is to select stocks based on our assessment of their long term worth and ability to outperform the market, without being restricted by a growth or value bias. Our fundamental company research focuses on valuation, franchise, management quality and risk factors (both financial and non-financial risk)
This Fund is designed for investors who want the potential for long term capital growth and tax effective income from a portfolio of primarily 40-60 Australian mid cap shares and are prepared to accept higher variability of returns.
Pendal defines the mid cap universe to include companies ranked between 51 and 150 of the S&P/ASX 200 Index. The Fund may also invest in equivalent companies listed on the New Zealand Stock Exchange, hold cash and may use derivatives. Pendal’s investment process for Australian shares is based on our core investment style and aims to add value through active stock selection and fundamental company research. Pendal’s core investment style is to select stocks based on our assessment of their long term worth and ability to outperform the market, without being restricted by a growth or value bias. Our fundamental company research focuses on valuation, franchise, management quality and risk factors (both financial and non-financial risk).
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