T. Rowe Price Asian Opportunities Equity

Manager Jihong Min invests across Asia ex-Japan in a concentrated portfolio of high-quality companies. These companies tend to be established, with leading market positions and good management teams who prioritise shareholder returns. Portfolio turnover is low, and the focus is on holding businesses for the long term.

Our opinion

T. Rowe Price Asian Opportunities Equity fund was previously managed by Eric Moffett but has now been taken over by Jihong Min. Jihong has a very similar philosophy of buying high quality companies run by high quality people and holding them for the long term. He has the backing of a strong analyst team on the ground, which is very beneficial. We are confident that Jihong can deliver good performance in the future and the fund is one we are watching closely.

Fund manager

Jihong Min became co-manager of T. Rowe Price Asian Opportunities Equity in July 2021 and is now sole manager. He has 18 years of investment experience having begun his career in investment banking at JP Morgan in 2003 before moving to analyst roles at Fortress Investment Group and Geosphere Capital. Jihong then joined T. Rowe in 2012 and worked as a financial analyst. Jihong has a BSC in business management from the State University of New York. He is currently based in Singapore.

Buy high-quality businesses, run by high-quality people, and hold them for the long term.

Jihong MinFund manager

Investment process

Jihong, with the help of the analyst team, seeks out high-quality businesses that will reliably compound earnings and sustain strong cash flow over time. These companies tend to be established companies, with leading market positions and good management teams who prioritise shareholder returns. He looks for returns-focused capital allocation and prudent balance sheet management.

An initial quantitative screen focuses on quality and valuation. Then detailed company analysis is undertaken. The team travels extensively throughout the region, meeting company management, industry experts and government policymakers, to aid in the search for companies which provide the greatest risk-adjusted return.

Once these high-quality compounders have been identified, valuation is assessed. Various valuation criteria are applied to each company, depending on which sector it operates. Valuation is assessed relative to local or global sector peers, as appropriate.

Whilst individual stock assessment is crucial, macroeconomic factors are also considered. The team looks at political stability, government policies, national accounts, central bank policy and currency stability, to name but a few things. Jihong then constructs a portfolio of 40-70 stocks.

ESG

ESG - Integrated
This fund uses environmental, social and governance (ESG) integration as part of its investment process. For T. Rowe this involves incorporating ESG factors to enhance investment decisions, meaning that they are not the sole driver of an investment decision, nor are they considered separately from more traditional analysis.

The process of ESG integration takes place on two levels: first, T. Rowe’s research analysts incorporate environmental, social, and governance factors into their company valuations and ratings; and, second, the portfolio manager balances these ESG factor exposures at the portfolio level. Both the analysts and portfolio manager are able to leverage dedicated, in-house resources to assist them in analysing ESG criteria. Material ESG factors play an integral part in the risk/reward assessment of each company. Once all the factors have been assessed, the conclusions can influence whether to include or exclude the company or at what weight to add the company to the portfolio. Usually, ESG factors are considered as a component of the final investment decision.

Risk

Risk management is embedded within the investment process and close attention is paid to ensuring diversification of exposures. Position sizes are determined by the potential upside of an individual stock; those with stable risk/return expectations tend to be bigger positions in the portfolio, while stocks with volatile risk/return expectations will be smaller ones.

See more

Read more about this fund

The information, data, analyses, and opinions contained herein (1) include the proprietary information of FundCalibre, (2) may not be copied or redistributed without prior permission, (3) do not constitute investment advice offered by FundCalibre, (4) are provided solely for informational purposes and therefore are not an offer to buy or sell a fund, and (5) are not warranted to be correct, complete, or accurate. FundCalibre shall not be responsible for any trading decisions, damages, or other losses resulting from, or related to, this information, data, analyses, or opinions or their use. The Elite Fund rating is subjective in nature and reflects FundCalibre’s current expectations of future events/behaviour as they relate to a particular fund. Because such events/behaviour may turn out to be different than expected, FundCalibre does not guarantee that a fund will perform in line with its FundCalibre benchmark. Likewise, the Elite Fund rating should not be seen as any sort of guarantee or assessment of the creditworthiness of a fund nor of its underlying securities and should not be used as the sole basis for making any investment decision. FundCalibre disclaims any responsibility for trading decisions, damages or other losses resulting from any use of the Elite Fund rating. All performance data, as well as fund size, OCF, AMC, annual income (historic), share price discount or premium, is sourced directly from FE Analytics, and will change periodically.