Abraham Darwyne

Freelance Journalist and Writer at Freelance

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Articles

5 Hong Kong equity funds up over 20% year-to-date

2 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

Stocks listed in Hong Kong appear to be entering into a bull market after rallying over 20% year-to-date, despite the looming uncertainty over tariffs. The recent rally comes after years of consolidation following a prolonged bear market. Hong Kong stocks are still down over 20% from the peak in February of 2021. But in the past six months, Hong Kong’s equity market has been boosted by a jump in IPO market activity, with a significant increase in larger deals.
AllianzGI’s Tobias Pross hopes to double private markets AUM

2 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

Allianz Global Investors is aiming to double its private markets assets under management (AUM) over the next decade. The firm’s chief executive officer Tobias Pross said at the Bloomberg Invest conference in Hong Kong on Wednesday that he aims to reach up to $200bn in private markets AUM. AllianzGI currently manages over $610bn of assets, of which around $110bn are invested in private markets, according to Pross.
Standard Chartered CIO: Investors are massively underweight US assets

2 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

After years of continued US dollar strength, the currency has declined some 10% year-to-date, as measured by the US dollar index (DXY). This decline was exacerbated by the uncertainty brought about by President Trump’s tariff announcements in April, prompting global investors to start rethinking their US exposure.
Allspring flags 3 major risks to markets

2 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

Before tariffs were suddenly shoved into the centre of investors’ minds, a soft landing for the US and global economy looked to be well established. But US growth has turned negative in the first quarter of the year and consumer inflation expectations have risen sharply since tariffs were announced. As such, a US tariff-induced inflation spike was cited as a top risk to markets by Allspring as it warns that US inflation expectations could rise sharply over the next year.
GMO: Quant-driven bond investing is a “ripe” opportunity

2 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

The US investment grade (IG) bond market has evolved to become a “fertile opportunity” for systematic strategies, according to fixed income portfolio managers at GMO. Since the global financial crisis in 2009, the US IG market has seen the number of bonds issued increase by 147%, and the number of issuers increase by 65%.
5 non-US funds outperforming the S&P 500 index

3 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

After several years of US stocks outperforming, other major equity markets are outpacing the S&P 500 index year-to-date. Global stocks more broadly, as measured by the MSCI World index, have outperformed US stocks by almost 5% so far this year. Although the index has a 71% weighting to US companies, other developed markets such as Europe and Japan have lifted its relative performance. The US dollar, as measured by the US Dollar Index (DXY), has declined some 10% from its peak in January.
M&G hires Neil Godfrey as global head of client group

3 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

M&G Investments has hired Neil Godfrey as global head of client group to lead all distribution, marketing and client experience teams, according to a statement from the firm. He will start on 16 June and become a member of the executive leadership team, reporting to Joseph Pinto, chief executive of M&G Investments. Godfrey will be replacing current global head of distribution and product Neal Brooks, who has decided to step down after almost 30 years at M&G.
UBS GWM: AI compute spend is nowhere near peak

3 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

In early 2025, DeepSeek’s artificial intelligence (AI) model breakthrough sparked investor doubts about the sustainability of the huge sums of money being spent on compute. However, a series of spending commitments from big tech companies, sovereign AI customers and so-called “neocloud” firms has quelled these concerns for now.
Hedge funds pitch Asian stocks at Sohn Hong Kong

3 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

Hedge funds see value in Japan, Korea and China-listed stocks as global investors start to reassess the so-called exceptionalism of US stocks after Trump’s tariffs. Stocks listed in Asian markets formed the majority of hedge funds’ top investment ideas at the annual Sohn conference held in Hong Kong on Friday. UK-based activist hedge fund Palliser Capital revealed it has built a $100m position in Japanese-listed Tire manufacturer Toyo Tire.
Asia high yield bond comeback could be short-lived: Morningstar

3 weeks ago | fundselectorasia.com | Abraham Darwyne

New World Development’s interest payment deferral could depress already weak investor sentiment for Hong Kong credit, according to Morningstar’s Arvind Subramanian. After rebounding sharply in 2024, Asian high yield bonds could see weakened returns and slowing fund flows due to New World Development’s (NWD) payment deferral. When the Hong Kong property developer announced the deferment of interest payments on its perpetual bonds on May 30, its bond price fell sharply alongside its shares.