Podcasts

Podcasts from Aberdeen Standard Investment Trusts: invest in good company.

Interviewer: Hello and welcome to the latest in our Aberdeen Standard Investment Trusts podcast series where we catch up with the Trust managers to explore how they're navigating these difficult conditions. With me today is Pruksa Iamthongthong from the Asia Dragon Trust to give her insight. Thank you for joining us today Pruksa. Now you're aiming to find areas of structural growth in the Asian economy, and obviously digitisation and the move to online has been very important during this pandemic, but can you explain why longer term e-commerce and online activity have such strong growth potential?

Pruksa: Well they have really been a force to be reckoned with during this pandemic. But if we were to look at how the growth has been and looking for a long term trajectory, I think online and e-commerce has clearly been very disruptive to traditional retail and simply because I think it’s the answer to various consumer needs, whether you think about the breadth of choices that the online world can offer at the click of your fingertips, the personalization of choices as well - as they gather more data about you, they can make recommendations according to your browsing habits. As well as the increased convenience in the increasingly fast paced world that we live in, it is convenient with deliveries coming to your doorstep. And ultimately, if all these things are done extremely well by an online provider, an e-commerce retailer, it does produce a very good customer experience. So I say why not - I think we are all converted during this Covid period. And therefore from a growth perspective, we do see a long runway for e-commerce and online activity or digitalisation across many verticals of the economy. And this applies to many parts of the world.

Interviewer: Okay, and what type of companies are you investing in to access this trend?

Pruksa: Well, we can access this trend from many ways, actually. Firstly, we can think about the ecosystem players that could be the providers of such online services. So for example, the likes of Tencent which is our core holding. Tencent as part of the business helps to digitalise the local small shops within the community. They provide Tencent Wechat pay - it has mini programmes that provide these shops with CRM or customer relationship management. And essentially, that allows small shops to convert their offline presence into an online and ultimately mostly an O to O model, which is an online to offline model. And that's how consumers today are actually accessing this service. And I think we actually see an acceleration of this happening during the Covid situation in China, where many of these offline retailers - businesses - have to be forced to go online to remain in business. So that could be one way. Another way, is in the enablers of digitalisation. And what I mean by this is it could be the investment into the building blocks of digitalisation. So, if you think about it, there is no secret that data is the key in digitalisation, and in others, and we go back to my earlier point about customer service. In order to provide that seamless customer service and experience, the ability to process data to store data, to facilitate interaction and exchange of data is extremely important. And all this needs to be powered by things like advanced semiconductor chips. And that is manufactured by the likes of TSMC. Taiwan Semiconductor, which we have in the portfolio and Samsung Electronics, both are core holdings in the Trust. We also invest in data centres in China, which will be the key infrastructure is supporting the rapid growth of cloud providers that are a key enabler in this area as well. And the third way could be a bit more traditional, it may be a traditional consumer goods company. One example that we can think of is a company in India. It’s an old company called Hindustan Unilever, which is the Indian subsidiary of Unilever. It is a household name that is well known for their consumer goods. But perhaps what is less known is how they have played a central role in the digitalization of e-commerce activity in India, which we know is - penetration of [modern trade] is actually very low. So a lot of trade in India happens on what you call a general trade and the small neighbourhood shops call Kirana which is - you can think of it as a little hole in the wall. It is very much a central part of that. So what this company does is they help to digitalize the Kiranas. They provide the app interface called Mykirana that allows these offline small Kiranas to go online again. And if you are a consumer in India, you open the app up, you can actually search for the Kirana that is closest to you and order online – again, it will be delivered to you at your doorstep. So something very, very handy during the Covid situation India as you can imagine.

Interviewer: Thank you so much Pruksa for your insights today, and thank you to our listeners for tuning in. For more information on the Trust, please do check our website, www.asiadragontrust.co.uk and do look out for future podcasts.

This podcast is provided for general information only and assumes a certain level of knowledge of financial markets. It is provided for information purposes only and should not be considered as an offer, investment recommendation or solicitation to deal in any of the investments and products mentioned herein and does not constitute investment research. The views in this podcast are those of the contributors at the time of publication and do not necessarily reflect those of Aberdeen Standard Investments. The value of investments and the income from them can go down as well as up and investors may get back less than the amount invested. Past performance is not a guide to future returns. Return projections are estimates and provide no guarantee of future results.

Podcasts from Aberdeen Standard Investment Trusts, invest in good company.

Interviewer: Hello and welcome to the latest in our Aberdeen Standard Investment Trusts podcast series, where we catch up with the Trust managers to explore how they're navigating these difficult times. With me today is Adrian Lim from the Asia Dragon Trust to give his insight. Thank you for joining us, Adrian. Now let's start by looking at the philosophy and approach of the trust – the Asia Dragon approach focuses on finding quality companies, and how are you defining quality?

Adrian: Well, quality means basically identifying companies that we think have the best attributes that position itself with the best possible chance of outperforming its peer group and its competition over the long term. This usually means that it requires a combination of good people and talent, not just managers, but throughout the company. It requires responsive and resilient business models that are effective, and the ability of the company to execute as a whole. We also look out for financial strength as well, which gives the resource that provides companies with a better chance of taking advantage of weaknesses within the competitive landscape that do come from time to time.

Interviewer: And you mentioned people there - what characteristics are you looking for in a management team?

Adrian: That's, that's quite easy to explain, but quite difficult to assess. We look for management teams that work well together as a team, that demonstrate competence within the fields that they operate or compete in, or the disciplines that they’re engages in. And, more importantly, but more difficult to measure is we like management teams that demonstrate integrity. Where they don’t just make sure that they do what's best for the company, but they make sure that the company does what's best for all shareholders equally.

Interviewer: And how are you incorporating ESG considerations into your process?

Adrian: ESG considerations are very much embedded into our search for quality. Often when we look at business models, and when we talk to management teams, and we assess them, we need to make sure that these management teams and their business models are sensitive to effectively manage the environmental, social and governance issues that are now coming to the fore in the investment community. Many of these issues we have been looking at over the last few decades of investing for the Trust. But increasingly it's coming up in discussions and we need to make sure that our management teams are aware and can communicate effectively about the things that they do to manage these issues.

Interview: Great. Okay, thank you so much Adrian for your insights today and thank you for listening. For more information on the Trust, please do check our website, www.asiadragontrust.co.uk and do look out for future podcasts.

This podcast is provided for general information only and assumes a certain level of knowledge of financial markets. It is provided for information purposes only and should not be considered as an offer, investment recommendation or solicitation to deal in any of the investments and products mentioned herein and does not constitute investment research. The views in this podcast are those of the contributors at the time of publication and do not necessarily reflect those of Aberdeen Standard Investments. The value of investments and the income from them can go down as well as up and investors may get back less than the amount invested. Past performance is not a guide to future returns. Return projections are estimates and provide no guarantee of future results.