Where is the real value in frontier markets?

ROMANIA & MONGOLIA

Stefan Bottcher, lead portfolio adviser for the Charlemagne Magna New Frontiers fund, explains his overweight positions in two of the lesser-known emerging economies .

Like most markets, 2011 was a tough one for frontier countries. This year has been stronger so far, albeit with a wide spread of performance. Overall, the 3.1% US dollar return achieved over the first two months of the year seems fairly unimpressive against 18% from emerging markets – but it includes gains of 22.8% in Romania, 20% in the UAE and 19.5% from Kazakhstan, as well as a fall of 6.4% in Bangladesh. Broadly speaking, frontier markets are not widely held by foreign investors and so are not influenced to the same extent by the inflows and outflows we see in more established mar...