HEAD-TO-HEAD: Aberdeen vs Eastspring

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The Aberdeen fund receives a Morningstar analyst rating of Neutral and a five-star rating, while the Eastspring fund receives a Morningstar analyst rating of Bronze and a four-star rating.

Morningstar’s analyst rating is a forward-looking analysis of a fund, while the star rating looks at historical risk-adjusted performance.

Analysts assign the analyst rating on a five-tier scale with three positive ratings of Gold, Silver, and Bronze, a Neutral rating, and a Negative rating. A Gold, Silver, or Bronze rating means Morningstar analysts think highly of the fund and expect it to outperform over a full market cycle of at least five years.

Yew prefers the Eastspring fund over the Aberdeen one because of Cashman’s longer track record and his team’s stabililty.

“The [Eastspring] team is definitely more stable, and if you look at the portfolio manager, he has managed the fund since the strategy’s inception in 2006, so it’s a longer track record.”

Yew would like to see how the Aberdeen fund would perform over a longer period of time in a more normalised market environment, he said, explaining that Kwok took over the fund in 2011 prior to all the changes under Abenomics.

But he is hopeful that Aberdeen will create clear team stability this year. “If they add a few more people, that would drive greater conviction on our part,” he said.

With regard to their investment processes, Yew said he likes them both.

“Aberdeen’s quality [selection] criteria applies not just to Japanese equities, it applies across a suite of Asian products. The investment philosophy is embedded within Aberdeen itself, so that is something that we like.”

As for Eastspring, he said that the fund manager has a long-standing process that has been delivering good returns.

“On the process side, it is not fair to say which fund is better,” Yew said. “Eastspring has an edge just because the team has greater stability.”

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