Omnis Global Emerging Markets Equity Opportunities Fund

Investment Objective

The fund aims to achieve a return consisting of both income and capital growth which, after all fees and expenses, exceeds the MSCI Emerging Markets TR Index over a five-year rolling period.

Lazard’s approach to investing in emerging markets is rooted in the discipline of finding undervalued companies with attractive financial productivity. The team believe that companies that meet these criteria not only participate in sharply rising markets, but are also able to defend well in down markets.

The investment process follows four key steps:

Database Screening and Fundamental Analyst Ideas: Screening seeks to identify companies that are attractively priced relative to their financial and eliminate stocks that do not meet the fund’s liquidity requirements.
Accounting Validation: the investment team examines companies’ stated financial statistics to consider how accounting decisions and policies may affect the valuation and/or reported growth. The added importance of this step in the overall investment process lies in seeking to avoid mistakes and minimise forecasting errors.
Detailed Bottom-Up Fundamental Analysis: Fundamental analysis is conducted to assess forward-looking issues, including the sustainability of returns, and to identify a catalyst for price re-evaluation. This involves on-the-ground visits to company management, as well as analysing a company’s quality and depth of management, competitive position, sensitivity to economic/market cycles and political risk, and ESG tailwinds or headwinds, among other factors.
Portfolio Construction: Once stocks have been identified, further analysis is conducted to help build a portfolio of stocks that is adequately diversified, with particular attention given to the portfolio’s risk attributes. The team’s buy and sell discipline adds further rigour to the process and enhances long-term value creation.

Lazard’s emerging market team’s research is enhanced by collaboration with Lazard’s broader investment capabilities and resources, including the firm’s ESG and Sustainable Investment team, and global sector specialists who conduct global and local research on companies worldwide.

Key Fund Facts

Stable, Experienced Team

Lazard has been investing in emerging markets for over 30 years now. Over 70 investment professionals from 19 different countries and speaking 20 different languages are part of Lazard’s Emerging Market Equity team.

Fundamental Research

The investment process relies on Lazard’s quality and depth of fundamental company research, which follows a well-structured process which has been consistently deployed over an extended period.

Market Capitalisation

The fund will draw on Lazard’s experience of investing across different sized companies in Emerging Markets. The fund will have at least 50% invested in small and medium sized companies (refer to investment policy below).

Introducing the Investment Manager

Since joining Lazard in 1996, James has been instrumental in developing and coordinating the emerging markets activities at Lazard. He began working in the investment field in 1983. Prior to joining Lazard, James was a Portfolio Manager with Mercury Asset Management. He has a BA (Hons) in history from the University of Western Ontario. James is a CFA® charterholder. James is a board member of EMpower, a charity of investment professionals focused on adolescents, healthcare, and women's issues in emerging markets countries, as well as a member of the 20-20 Investments Association, an investor group that is focused on emerging markets.

Lazard Asset Management

Investment Policy

The fund intends to invest at least 80% in the equity securities of Emerging Markets companies defined as those which are domiciled, incorporated or have a significant exposure to Emerging Markets. The fund will adopt a flexible approach to investment, seeking to invest in companies that are undervalued relative to their economic potential. Exposure to small and medium size companies will be greater than 50% of the fund. Small and medium sized companies are defined as those with a market cap of $10 billion or less at the time of the fund’s investment. Companies whose capitalisation no longer meets this definition after investment will continue to be considered small and medium market capitalisation companies.

The fund may also invest in other transferable securities (for example, equity securities of other international companies), units in collective investment schemes (including schemes managed and operated by the ACD or its associates), money market instruments, warrants, cash, near cash and deposits as detailed in the Prospectus.

It is envisaged that the investment portfolio of the fund will be concentrated, typically comprising between 40 and 80 holdings.

Derivatives may be used for the purposes of hedging and efficient portfolio management.

Omnis Investments

Omnis Global Emerging Markets Equity Opportunities Fund

Investment Manager

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