Ascender Capital finds opportunities in Northeast Asia

Asian stocks have been on a bit of a ride in October as geopolitical concerns and global market volatility weigh on performance. But one fund sees a long-term case for investing in Asian equities provided investors focus on quality and are willing to look at each company on a case-by-case basis

Ascender Capital's flagship strategy provides panAsian equities exposure with a quality overlay. The strategy focuses specifically on companies that have a strong record of corporate governance, cash efficiency, and profitability. "We are ultimately a long-biased value fund of Asian equities," explains Ascender founder and CIO Edouard Mercier in an interview with Opalesque New Managers. "Our investment team is made up of former entrepreneurs and business owners, which helps us in our due diligence process and in the way we engage with management teams on business strategy and capital allocation policies."

Prior to launching Ascender, Mercier founded technology company Sendit, which was acquired by Microsoft in 1999. Andrin Bachminn, co-founder and partner was previously a co-founder of Glocalnet, which became Sweden's 3rd largest consumer telecom service provider before being acquired by Telenor. Both men have also spent time making venture capital-style investments in telecom and technology companies globally.

According to Mercier, by focusing on issues like governance, the team can build in a margin of safety within the strategy and identify companies that are likely to have a high return on invested capital. The result is a portfolio of compounding companies that support the strategy's target of double-digit absolute returns with a low correlation to the overall market

Mercier has a hands-on approach to picking the companies in the portfolio. Once a company makes the list of potential investments, analysts on Mercier's team take a deep dive into co......................

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This article was published in Opalesque's New Managers a top-down monthly analysis, news and research publication on the global emerging manager space.