The start of summer saw a sharp reversal of a crowded momentum and artificial intelligence (AI) trade, sparking volatility in tech stocks, which weighed down global equity returns.

This was coupled with an ongoing conflict in the Middle East and upward pressure on bond yields over inflationary worries as well as growing fiscal deficits and bond issuance by both governments and technology companies.

Despite a relatively flat return for the period, global indices were under pressure from wild moves in tech stocks, most notably in semiconductors.

During this period, global equity funds focused on healthcare, value and defensive stocks were among the best performers, according to data compiled from FE fundinfo.

Below, FSA looks at the top-10 performing global equity funds available for distribution in either Hong Kong or Singapore for the 10-week period between 1/6/26 to 10/8/2026.

Fund	Return (%)
Janus Henderson Horizon Biotechnology	17.28
iShares Ageing Population UCITS ETF	12.89
MFS Meridian Contrarian Value	12.04
Fidelity FAST Global	11.45
DWS Invest CROCI World Value	11.06
Lazard Global Equity Franchise	10.91
iShares MSCI EAFE Value Index	10.13
Allspring (Lux) Worldwide Global Small Cap Equity	10.02
Algebris Financial Equity	9.97
Troy Asset Management Ltd Trojan Ethical Income	9.94
MFS Meridian Global Concentrated	9.7
Dominion Global Trends Managed	9.47
BNP Paribas SMaRT FOOD	9.36
Schroder ISF Global Sustainable Value	9.28
Robeco Biodiversity Equities	9.2
JPM Global Healthcare	9.2
VP Bank Future Citizen	8.9
Redwheel Global Intrinsic Value	8.72
DWS Invest CROCI Global Dividends	8.66
Morgan Stanley Global Endurance	8.64

The top performer over the summer period was the Janus Henderson Horizon Biotechnology, managed by Andy Acker, Daniel Lyons and Agustin Mohedas. This fund had a performance of 17.28%.

Biotechnology stocks have seen a recent surge as companies in the sector continue to make clinical breakthroughs and large-cap pharmaceutical firms accelerate their merger and acquisition activity.

There were a number of value-focused strategies in the list of top-performers, including MFS Meridian Contrarian Value, DWS Invest CROCI World Value and iShares MSCI EAFE Value Index.

Value funds performed strongly during the momentum unwind as investors tended to favour cheap stocks with a margin of safety and stable earnings growth as high-flying growth names sold off.

Elsewhere, two strategies with a focus on investing in stocks with defensive characteristics were in the list of top performers: namely Lazard Global Equity Franchise and Trojan Ethical Income.

The Lazard Global Equity Franchise, managed by Warryn Robertson, John Mulquiney, Bertrand Cliquet and Matthew Landy, invests in companies they consider have an “economic franchise” in the form of high earnings forecastability and large competitive advantages.

The Trojan Ethical Income fund, managed by Blake Hutchins, Fergus McCorkell and Aniruddha Kulkarni, focuses on investing in companies with growing dividends through their own conservative quality-orientated process.