SLI signs distribution agreement with Finland's Aktia (FI)

Standard Life Investments has announced that it has signed an agreement with Aktia, the Finnish Savings Bank, to distribute its Global REIT Focus Fund in Finland. Aktia serves as the central financial institute for savings and local co-operative banks in Finland.

The Global REIT Focus Fund (SICAV) invests largely in Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) or securities and companies principally engaged in real estate activities on a global basis. The fund aims to maximise total return from income and capital growth over the longer term. By investing in indirect property, the fund offers unique access to global property markets and the ability to diversify investors' existing property portfolios.

Managed by Andrew Jackson, with Svitlana Gubriy as deputy manager, the fund aims to outperform the FTSE EPRA/NAREIT Global Index by 2% per annum. Andrew Jackson and Svitlana Gubriy are the same portfolio management team behind the highly successful Select Property Fund. The Global REIT funds will employ largely the same rigorous investment process to ensure the prospect of strong returns.

Tom Ginman, CEO of Aktia, said: "We have chosen Standard Life Investments as partner as we believe their property products, team and track record meets with our client requirements and fills a gap in our skill set."

Åsa Norrie, Investment Director – Denmark, Finland, Norway & Sweden, Standard Life Investments, said: "Aktia is one of Finland's most respected financial institutions, with an extensive network of more than 400 branches. By working together, we can provide Finnish investors with the opportunity to benefit from Standard Life Investments' well-renowned and robust property fund management expertise."

"There is a great deal of demand from Finnish investors to gain access to the global property market, but high quality offerings in the global listed property market are rare. The Global REIT Focus Fund combines the unique insights of our extensive property research team with enhanced access to company management afforded by our scale and market coverage. By investing in the fund, investors can look forward to the prospect of accessing an asset class with low correlation to other key asset classes over the long term and with daily liquidity at low costs."

"Our agreement with Aktia is very much in line with SLI's strategy in Finland - and indeed the Nordic region in general. By providing our clients with truly unique solutions, we seek to fill the gaps that can sometimes exist in their domestic product offering. This is not just in global real estate but also in other asset classes such as regional as well as global offerings within equities, fixed income, global absolute return products and private equity."

Last week Standard Life Investments announced that it had signed a partnership agreement with Merrant, the Swedish multi-manager company. The agreement will see SLI's China Equity Fund (SICAV) forming part of five Merrant multi-manager funds - Kina, BRIC, Asien, Emerging Markets and Global. SLI's India Equity Fund (SICAV) will also form part of Merrant's BRIC multi-manager fund. Merrant is a subsidiary of Alicia Capital Management, an independent Swedish capital management firm with extensive experience and expertise within global asset management.

Source: SLI

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