Japanese investors develop an appetite for Russian risk

In a move that demonstrates the broadening appeal of Russian assets, HSBC Investments has launched the first pure Russian equity fund for Japanese investors, raising more than $150 million since launching a marketing campaign at the end of March.

The HSBC Russia Open Fund will be managed by Halbis, HSBC’s specialist asset management arm, and is available to both retail and institutional investors.

The Russia Open Fund completes HSBC Investments’ stable of Japanese investor-focused equity funds that cover the core BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) emerging market economies. At the end of the first quarter of 2007, HSBC Investments had attracted more than $4 billion to its emerging market equity products in Japan, comprising about 7% of the $60 billion-plus stock of emerging markets equities it manages on a worldwide basis.

Although Japanese investors have traditionally been highly conservative in their investment outlook – about $7 trillion of the total $13 trillion of financial assets owned by Japanese investors is invested in time deposits in Japan that earn an annual return of just 0.5%

Access this research

Enter your work email address to sign in or check whether your organisation already has access to Euromoney.