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Bailey McCann, Opalesque New York:

Visio Capital, the second oldest hedge fund in South Africa has started taking on a greater role as a local activist shareholder, according to head of Investor Relations, Craig French in a recent Opalesque TV interview. French says that as more companies mature on the ground, there is room to push for the kinds of shareholder value improvements common to activist strategies here in the US.

"If we have to look at the portfolios at present around 20% of the exposure is to companies where the team actively is engaged with the Board," French explains. "This really takes the form of looking at issues like Board composition and the relevance thereof to the company. It can look at issues like capital allocation over time, trying to understand if management teams are adequately incentivized and so forth."

French says that the firm has developed a long history of not only talking to companies and boards, but also to local competitors and customers which informs their activism. The high touch activist strategy also includes on-site visits to the companies themselves and a broad internal consensus before a given company is included in the portfolio.

"We have a very flat structure. All fund managers, as we call them, are expected to bring ideas to the table, and we will then debate those," French says.

Those debates a......................

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