Security Bank Corp. said its trust and asset management group will launch three new unit investment trust funds in the coming days into its roster of investment product offerings to provide the public more ways to invest and diversify their financial portfolios.
Through the new funds, Filipinos with a moderately-conservative and aggressive risk profile can access new financial growth opportunities with an investment time horizon from six months to at least three years. These funds will be available starting September 6, it said.
“We’re excited to offer these new funds to our clients who would like to expand their investment horizon with new diverse ways to grow their hard-earned money. We hope these new UITFs will encourage more Filipinos to access the financial markets not only locally but also the US markets and invest,” Noel Reyes, the group’s chief investment officer, said.
To cater to the moderately conservative investor, the bank is launching the SB Peso Cash Management Fund. The bank said it lowered the minimum investment amount to P5,000 from P10,000 for its other peso UITFs.
By investing in this fund, investors can access high yielding Bank deposits and short-term government and BSP securities and with much less volatility as duration is shorter than most money market funds offered in the market, said Dino Aquino, the group’s fund manager.
For the more aggressive investor, the bank is also launching its new thematic funds, the SB US Technology Equity Index Feeder Fund, which give access to US stocks in the technology sector through the Invesco Nasdaq 100 ETF, which comprise of the largest 100 innovative companies that are driving growth in the US. These include companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Tesla and Google.
Meanwhile, its SB ESG Aware Equity Index Feeder Fund will tap large and mid-cap ESG-focused, or environment, social and governance, US companies through the iShares ESG Aware MSCI USA ETF.
The initial investment amount for the two new feeder funds is $1,000 and minimum top up is $500. Clients investing in these feeder funds are recommended to stay invested for at least three years to maximize returns typical of investing in equity fund, it said.
For the SB US Technology Equity Index Feeder Fund, investors can gain access to the feeder fund’s Target Fund, Invesco Nasdaq-100 ETF.
Through its target fund, the iShares ESG Aware MCSI USA ETF, Filipinos will be able to integrate ESG into their portfolio whilst still achieving potential larger returns from the US equity market.
“The ESG fund employs an optimization process to maximize exposure to ESG factors while maintaining a target tracking error to the parent MSCI USA index within a specified range, targeting companies with high ESG ratings in different sectors,” the bank said.
To date, Security Bank’s offers a total of 10 funds that cover the whole range of funds, from money market fund, peso and dollar equity funds including PSEi index tracker fund and feeder funds that cover US, global and Asia excluding-Japan markets.