Asset Allocation & Fund Positioning, Copley Fund Research

Steven Holden

Steven Holden is the CEO and Founder of Copley Fund Research, an independent provider of research on equity fund positioning and performance.  Set up in 2014, Copley focuses on global, global emerging market, US, Asia Ex-Japan and China active equity funds, covering over $4tr in assets across 1300 active managers.  The company provides data and analysis on market trends, manager exposures and active fund performance to an audience of investment managers, pension funds and fund selectors worldwide.  Mr Holden’s 14-year investment banking career started in 2000, where he worked for Morgan Stanley as an equity derivative trader focused on emerging markets in London.  Following this, he spent 4 years at Citibank in London and Hong Kong as an Executive Director in derivative sales, focused again on emerging markets.

Asset Allocation & Fund Positioning

NIO: Dark Cloud Cover with Close Below the 10-Day EMA on Friday May Add A Short Term Bearish Signal

Copley Fund Research

Copley Fund Research provide research and data on asset allocation among Global and Emerging Market equity funds.  The analysis details absolute and relative positioning across countries, sectors and industries together with highly granular data on single stock and single fund allocations.  The data is updated monthly with time series going back to January 2011.

Global Research - Analysis of 165 prominent Global equity funds, combined AUM $335bn
GEM Research - Analysis of 127 prominent global EM equity funds, combined AUM $250bn

Asset Allocation - Global and GEM Equity

Thematic (Sector/Industry)

Kenya Automobiles / Thematic (Sector/Industry)

EM Autos are the 10th largest industry group weight among active EM managers, with average weights of 1.55%.  The more interesting metric however, is the extent to which Autos have become one of the largest industry level underweights across global EM.  The increased underweight has almost exclusively been driven by two stocks, <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/nio-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:27399:1" rel="noopener">NIO Inc (NIO US)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/byd-co-ltd-h" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:20962:1" rel="noopener">BYD (1211 HK</a>, with both seeing benchmark weights rise on the back of strong price increases.Such outright volatility has created a challenge for active managers who are benchmarked to the MSCI Emerging Markets Index.   Namely, how do you position yourself in a prominent index component that rises 900% in the space of 12 months?  The temptation might be to add <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/nio-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:27399:1" rel="noopener">NIO Inc (NIO US)</a> to a portfolio to dampen some of that benchmark risk, and indeed we have seen that happening among managers with low active shares.However, so far, high active managers have remained on the sidelines, sticking instead with more established autos stocks of <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/kia-motors-corp" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:156:1" rel="noopener">Kia Motors Corp (000270 KS)</a> , <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/geely-automobile-holdings-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:127:1" rel="noopener">Geely Auto (175 HK)</a> and <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/hero-motocorp-ltd" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:2391:1" rel="noopener">Hero Motocorp (HMCL IN)</a>.  Therefore, there is very little peer group risk in avoiding either <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/nio-inc" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:27399:1" rel="noopener">NIO Inc (NIO US)</a> or <a href="https://www.smartkarma.com/entities/byd-co-ltd-h" target="_blank" data-smartkarma-citation="entities:20962:1" rel="noopener">BYD (1211 HK)</a> .  In fact, if a high active manager decides to invest in either stock, it will represent an out-of-consensus long compared to the majority of your active peers.

EM Autos are the 10th largest industry group weight among active EM managers, with average weights of 1.55%.  The more interesting metric however, is the extent to which Autos have become one of the largest industry level underweights across global EM.  The increased underweight has almost exclusively been driven by two stocks, NIO Inc (NIO US) and BYD (1211 HK, with both seeing benchmark weights rise on the back of strong price increases.Such outright volatility has created a challenge for active managers who are benchmarked to the MSCI Emerging Markets Index.   Namely, how do you position yourself in a prominent index component that rises 900% in the space of 12 months?  The temptation might be to add NIO Inc (NIO US) to a portfolio to dampen some of that benchmark risk, and indeed we have seen that happening among managers with low active shares.However, so far, high active managers have remained on the sidelines, sticking instead with more established autos stocks of Kia Motors Corp (000270 KS) , Geely Auto (175 HK) and Hero Motocorp (HMCL IN).  Therefore, there is very little peer group risk in avoiding either NIO Inc (NIO US) or BYD (1211 HK) .  In fact, if a high active manager decides to invest in either stock, it will represent an out-of-consensus long compared to the majority of your active peers.

EM Autos Underweight:  Ignore Benchmark Risk and Focus on Peers