Partner, River Valley Asset Management

River Valley Asset Management

Partner

Singapore-based boutique asset management firm

River Valley Asset Management is a Singapore-based boutique asset management firm. Our team at RVAM strongly believes in being a trusted steward of our clients' wealth across generations.

Each of our fund managers has years of rich portfolio management experience over multiple market cycles at world-class investment houses. We bring our clients the combined strength of our investment team to manage their financial portfolios and to provide bespoke guidance on all aspects of their financial health.

We offer multi-asset class expert investment advice to accredited investors who are family offices, high net worth individuals and institutional investors to preserve and grow our clients' wealth.

The fund management team of the company includes Homiyar Vasania, Anand Ramachandran and Jamshed Desai.

MSCI AC Asia Pacific Excluding Japan Index / ESG

MSCI AC Asia Pacific Excluding Japan Index

All investments involve some degree of risk. In finance, risk refers to the degree of uncertainty and/or potential financial loss inherent in an investment decision. When making decisions we evaluate a variety of risks, business, economic, volatility, etc. Among them, regulatory risk is one of the most difficult ones to always get a grip on, across countries. Regulatory risks which many a times comes out of sharp changes in Government policy, are often unforeseen or least expected. Such risks often include seemingly and irrationally high unexpected doses of taxation, investors are caught blindsided, wondering how they could have missed handicapping such an event when building their investment case.The outcome of such actions often precipitates a violent reaction in the stock price of companies directly impacted, giving investors no time to respond or react when the first stab of price action happens. These are the proverbial bolts from the blue, that knock the stuffing out of stock prices for quite some time before some recover their pose, while many don’t for years. As markets enter phases of rising volatility, the risks of stock taking knocks from unexpected actions rise and we have seen quite a few this year. Our piece this month is inspired by some of these.

All investments involve some degree of risk. In finance, risk refers to the degree of uncertainty and/or potential financial loss inherent in an investment decision. When making decisions we evaluate a variety of risks, business, economic, volatility, etc. Among them, regulatory risk is one of the most difficult ones to always get a grip on, across countries. Regulatory risks which many a times comes out of sharp changes in Government policy, are often unforeseen or least expected. Such risks often include seemingly and irrationally high unexpected doses of taxation, investors are caught blindsided, wondering how they could have missed handicapping such an event when building their investment case.The outcome of such actions often precipitates a violent reaction in the stock price of companies directly impacted, giving investors no time to respond or react when the first stab of price action happens. These are the proverbial bolts from the blue, that knock the stuffing out of stock prices for quite some time before some recover their pose, while many don’t for years. As markets enter phases of rising volatility, the risks of stock taking knocks from unexpected actions rise and we have seen quite a few this year. Our piece this month is inspired by some of these. 

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

Global markets are showing diverging trends in terms of both economic growth and asset prices. The synchronized recovery of last year has become sharply asynchronous this year. Add to that worries on emerging market contagion and trade war between the two largest economies in the world, no wonder markets are looking wobbly.  In uncertain times like these, it is sometimes better to look at history and facts rather than forward conjectures and doomsday extrapolations. In this monthly outlook from <a href="http://www.rivervalleyasset.com/" target="_blank">River Valley Asset Mgt.</a>, we look at two key facts which are stark and tell their own story. From an investment perspective, given where valuations are in Asia, the long run forward return expectations are increasingly looking attractive. Good businesses normally do not trade cheap, but there are times when uncertainty in the environment presents such an opportunity and wealth creation is about grabbing those instances. We think one such phase in a market cycle is about to be presented to investors who are patient and astute.

Global markets are showing diverging trends in terms of both economic growth and asset prices. The synchronized recovery of last year has become sharply asynchronous this year. Add to that worries on emerging market contagion and trade war between the two largest economies in the world, no wonder markets are looking wobbly.  In uncertain times like these, it is sometimes better to look at history and facts rather than forward conjectures and doomsday extrapolations. In this monthly outlook from River Valley Asset Mgt., we look at two key facts which are stark and tell their own story. From an investment perspective, given where valuations are in Asia, the long run forward return expectations are increasingly looking attractive. Good businesses normally do not trade cheap, but there are times when uncertainty in the environment presents such an opportunity and wealth creation is about grabbing those instances. We think one such phase in a market cycle is about to be presented to investors who are patient and astute.  

As the year dawned, crystal gazing into 2018, we highlighted the dichotomy between bottom up opportunities which continued to excite us and weighed it versus risk from optimism and excessive valuations in narrow segments of market. Our view was that the ride will not be smooth and volatility is likely to rear its head and as investment managers our focus should be on managing the downside risk. Never did we imagine that the first three months of the year will throw up all kinds of new challenges as markets battled with policy uncertainty.  At <a href="http://www.rivervalleyasset.com/" target="_blank">River Valley Asset Management</a>, we continue to believe that rising debt burden puts a natural cap on the extent to which growth can accelerate as also the ability of interest rates to keep rising without causing collateral damage. The last decade has been a period of passing the parcel on debt growth - as households and financial sector deleveraged post the financial crisis, government's stepped in with a borrowing binge and as official sector debt started petering out over the last three years, we are back with rapid growth in financial sector leverage. Through all this growth rates have been tepid. With such a backdrop, if rates start rising the debt service burden could become a constraint on growth acceleration, in absence of productivity.

As the year dawned, crystal gazing into 2018, we highlighted the dichotomy between bottom up opportunities which continued to excite us and weighed it versus risk from optimism and excessive valuations in narrow segments of market. Our view was that the ride will not be smooth and volatility is likely to rear its head and as investment managers our focus should be on managing the downside risk. Never did we imagine that the first three months of the year will throw up all kinds of new challenges as markets battled with policy uncertainty.  At River Valley Asset Management, we continue to believe that rising debt burden puts a natural cap on the extent to which growth can accelerate as also the ability of interest rates to keep rising without causing collateral damage. The last decade has been a period of passing the parcel on debt growth - as households and financial sector deleveraged post the financial crisis, government's stepped in with a borrowing binge and as official sector debt started petering out over the last three years, we are back with rapid growth in financial sector leverage. Through all this growth rates have been tepid. With such a backdrop, if rates start rising the debt service burden could become a constraint on growth acceleration, in absence of productivity.   

Volatility, Debt Burden and Investment Strategy

China

The MSCI AC Asia Pacific excluding Japan Index is a free-float weighted equity index. It was developed with a base value of 100 as of December 31, 1987.

MSCI AC Asia Pacific Excluding Japan Index (MXAPJ INDEX)

MSCI AC Asia Pacific Excluding Japan Index (MXAPJ INDEX)

Bolts from the Blue

All investments involve some degree of risk. In finance, risk refers to the degree of uncertainty and/or potential financial loss inherent in an...

River Valley Asset Management

Opportunities in Times of Uncertainty

Global markets are showing diverging trends in terms of both economic growth and asset prices. The synchronized recovery of last year has become...

River Valley Asset Management

Volatility, Debt Burden and Investment Strategy

As the year dawned, crystal gazing into 2018, we highlighted the dichotomy between bottom up opportunities which continued to excite us and weighed...

River Valley Asset Management