Fund Monitors Pty Ltd

www.fundmonitors.com
© Copyright 2026
Printed: 21 September 2026 2:10 AM

17 Feb 2016 - Pengana Absolute Return Asia Pacific Fund

By: Australian Fund Monitors
Copy Article Link

Report Date12 February 2016
ManagerPengana Capital
Fund NamePengana Absolute Return Asia Pacific Fund
StrategyEquity Long/Short
Latest Return DateJanuary 2016
Latest Return-2.02%
Latest 6 Months-1.18%
Latest 12 Months1.51%
Latest 24 Months6.78%
Annualised Since Inception9.69%
Inception Date01 September 2010
FUM (millions)AU$96.8
Fund OverviewThe Pengana Absolute Return Asia Pacific Fund employs an event-driven investment strategy that seeks to exploit the mispricing of securities of companies involved in corporate transactions within the Asian (including Japan, Australia and New Zealand) region. Event driven strategies involve investing in opportunities created by significant transactional events, such as mergers and acquisitions, earnings surprises, capital management initiatives, capital structure arbitrage and index changes, among others. The Fund believes that significant corporate events can often create inefficiency in a company's share price which the Fund then seeks to exploit. The Fund aims to generate consistently positive returns which have a low correlation to the Asian stock markets. The objective is to generate 10-20% pa with a standard deviation of 6-10%.

The Fund will usually hold 40 to 80 positions and will be well diversified across the various event strategies. In keeping with the absolute return focus the Manager will eliminate market risk where appropriate by hedging market and foreign currency risks. Since inception the Fund has averaged a net equity market exposure of ~10%.

Sizing of an investment position will depend on the expected risk adjusted returns while taking account the liquidity and volatility of the stock. In addition, the maximum potential loss on any one position should be greater than 0.5% of the NAV and the position should not exceed 30% participation of stressed volume assuming a $200m NAV. Other criteria considered are ability to hedge and the availability of pair candidates as well as the average bid-ask size. For M&A strategies average long position is 3 to 5.5% and average short position 2 to 5%.
Manager CommentsThe Pengana Absolute Return Asia Pacific Fund finished -2.0% for the month, compared to the HFR Event Driven Index which closed -3.8%. Asia Pacific markets sold off sharply -8.0%, with volatility measured by VIX hitting a high of 30. Since inception, the Fund has an annualised return of 9.69% p.a., and achieved this with low volatility of 6.18%.

The negative performance of the Fund can be mostly attributed to the M&A sub-strategy where deal spreads widened globally. The Fund exploited this dislocation by increasing gross exposure to 226.3% by month end but maintaining net at 9.2%. Positive contributors for the month were the Stubs and Capital Structuring strategies. Largest detractors by region were USA/Canada, Hong Kong/China and Australia. Japan and Indonesia contributed positively for the month.

Click below to read the latest Fund Manager's Report.
More Information

Australian Fund Monitors Pty Ltd
A.C.N. 122 226 724
AFSL 324476
Email: contact@fundmonitors.com
Live chat