13th Jun 2019 12:59
(Alliance News) - Jupiter Emerging & Frontier Income Trust PLC said Thursday it underperformed against its benchmark index for the first half of its financial year, a challenging period for the trust's target markets.
For the six months to the end of March, the investment trust's net asset value total return was 0.4%, compared to the MSCI Emerging Markets Index which returned 1.8%.
Net asset value per share as at March 31 was 98.61 pence, down from 108.75p the same date the year before, but up slightly from 98.26p as at September 30.
Jupiter Emerging & Frontier's share price was 97.40p at the end of March, reflecting a 1.2% discount to net asset value.
Shares in the investment trust were up 0.9% on the day Thursday at 96.95 pence, having declined since the period-end.
Jupiter Emerging & Frontier said that during the period its portfolio faced several headwinds, including several emerging market small-cap stocks underperforming their large-cap peers.
The trust said this was likely due to the high level of passive inflows into the emerging markets asset class, relative to active flows. These inflows tend to benefit large cap stocks in the short term.
In a broader sense, on top of the US-China trade conflict and currency concerns, there also was political risk during the six months, namely Brazilian elections in October.
"While no-one can be immune to these developments - many of which are driven by domestic political agendas in the developed economies - our fund managers will continue to concentrate on identifying companies with strong management and competitive advantage," said Chair John Scott.
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