Investors used to prefer privately owned enterprises (POEs) over state owned enterprises (SOEs) in owning Chinese equities in the past. This was under the conventional thinking that the former tends to be more efficient, growth and profit-oriented, and innovation driven, while the latter is often constrained by more bureaucracy and non-profit priorities including social responsibility, support employment and social stability, and traditional DNA that are less conducive to changes and innovations. With strong government backing and all the new government policies promoting the SOE reforms and emphasizing SOEs’ value discovery, it may be time to challenge the stereotype as there emerges a new cohort of SOEs that begs to differ and has full backing of policy makers to reinvent themselves and unlock values to commensurate their contributions to the real economy. In this article we discuss the background behind the SOE re-rating/ revaluation trade that has become popular lately, and identify the optimal way of getting the right exposure of Chinese SOEs.

Internet platforms used to be the dominating forces in driving China’s tech cycle in the last decade, but their high-growth phases in e-commerce, gaming, ride-hailing and last-mile delivery are slowing substantially as indicated by the latest result announcement and management guidance. Changes in government policy, antitrust concerns, breach of data security and maturing markets are all pointing to a less promising outlook of their business models. On the contrary, hardcore technology, particularly the semiconductor, is the rising star in the market despite the increasing hostile actions taken by the Biden administration. This article would explain why semiconductor will be one of the key focuses of China’s stock market in the foreseeable future and how Premia China STAR50 ETF is the right tool to capture the industry opportunities as investors reposition for the paradigm shift in the technology space in China.

If we agree China may offer outperformance in 2023, then the next step is to figure out the right positioning to capture the alphas. Investors are now at a crossroad to decide whether China tech is still investible. On one hand, the Internet platforms, used to be the market leaders, may no longer be the high-growth candidates in future as shown by the recent sluggish financial results. On the other hand, technological advancement remains one of the government’s key agendas that should help support the sector. In this article, we would like to share how to identify the “right” tech exposure to capture the opportunities in China market.

Premia Asia Innovative Technology ETF (AIT) since its inception in 2018, was designed to capture the Asia leaders powering the growth of existing and emerging innovative technologies. Without a doubt, the hottest theme trending now is the Metaverse, as Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced earlier that the company name change and sees the Metaverse as the “successor to the mobile internet”. While this is still an emerging but quickly evolving topic, there are already considerable number of Asia leaders active in the space as emerging metaverse natives. How can investors position for opportunities early in this space?

The recent regulatory crackdowns and power suspension in China have unnerved many international investors. How to configure for opportunities under the lens of common prosperity and China’s commitment for carbon neutrality by 2060? In this article, we compare the Premia China STAR50 ETF (3151.HK) and Premia CSI Caixin China New Economy ETF (3173.HK), and discuss why they are useful implementation tools to capture long term opportunities in hardcore technology and strategic new economy sectors under the 14th Five Year Plan.

China market saw a material correction due to the regulatory crackdown in the offshore tech and education space. The panic sentiment led to indiscriminative unwinding of Chinese stocks by foreign investors, pushing the HK-listed tech names and the US-listed China ADRs into a bear market technically. Although the regulatory risks remain high in near-term, investors seem getting a stronger hint about the policy direction. The glory days when China tech can be simplistically covered by just the offshore tech giants is gone, and there is increasing need for more granular understanding of the related policy headwinds and tailwinds. In this article our Partner & Co-CIO David Lai shares the thesis behind our Premia China STAR50 ETF, and how this timely launch adds value through its diversified exposure of the leading innovative and strategically important hi-tech companies focusing on innovation and hardcore technology.

We recently completed the annual rebalancing exercise for the two China A shares and Asia Innovative Technology ETFs. In this article our Portfolio Manager Alex and Partner & Co-CIO David will share more about the changes and portfolio characteristics post-rebalancing, which further align with strategic focuses of China’s 14th Five Year Plan, and recalibrate for opportunities in the new normal as COVID recovery in China and Asia enters the next stage.

China’s tough new regulations on its tech giants will result in competitive gains for consumers, level the playing field for small and medium enterprises, and generate productivity gains for the economy.

According to the United Nation Environment Programme, an inclusive green economy is an alternative to today's dominant economic model, which exacerbates inequalities, encourages waste, triggers resource scarcities, and generates widespread threats to the environment and human health.

我们观察到资产配置模式在转变：在传统的地域或因子主导的基础模式上需要注入更多对新旧产业区分及大趋势发展的考量，从而在经济结构性改变中捕捉到长期超额收益。

From a total portfolio perspective, global asset owners and allocators are increasing wary about the overall portfolio sensitivity to interest rate changes and ultimately risk diversification. The concept of “equity duration” was raised long ago and has been subject to debate for decades. While some absolute calculations fail to work in today’s markets, we believe the economic and financial intuition beneath still hold. In this working paper, we took a renewed approach to analyze the relationships from a relative perspective and with an overarching objective of total portfolio risks in mind.

COVID-19 will likely go down in history as – among other things – an accelerant for a range of tendencies are already present prior to the pandemic. AC (after-COVID), these are the four major behavioral changes that are unlikely to revert to life as we knew it BC (before-COVID).

For Premia CSI Caixin China Bedrock Economy ETF (2803.HK), there were 90 changes among the underlying index constituents during the latest rebalancing in June. The one-way turnover ratio was 33.5%, in line with the historical range between 30% and 40%. The value factor continued to work well with the ETF becoming more attractive in terms of valuation by replacing overvalued stocks with undervalued one. The forward price-to-earnings ratio dropped from 8.1x to 6.3x whilst the price-to-book ratio remained at 1.1x. The quality factor also functioned as designed with both return-on-equity ratio and profit margin increased post-rebalancing. The former rose from 8.9% to 9.7% and the latter increased from 11.3% to 13.6%, reflecting the current stock pool is healthier in financials and stronger in profitability. In addition, the low-volatility screen did help reduce the portfolio’s risk, as shown by the volatility falling from 29.5% to 28.9%. Last but not least, the index’s revenue rose from RMB 19.1 billion to RMB 21.1 billion, capturing the mainstream economy of China. Overall the post rebalancing portfolio represents a basket of constituents with better resilience during the COVID and US China tension induced market growth, with cheaper valuaton, higher ROE, higher profitability, strong debt coverage and lower volatility.From a sector perspective, the major change was reducing exposure in Consumer Discretionary and Industrials, and increasing weights in Financials, Real Estate and Utilities. Drilling down into sub-segments, the additions in Financials are mostly leading banks with attractive valuation, while the deletions in Consumer Discretionary are mostly automobiles related given the challenged fundamentals for the sector. Notwithstanding the market environment, Chinese banks so far have only been affected mildly by the economic slowdown. For example, the industry’s return-on-equity fell slightly from 11.7% to 11.0% and NPL ratio edged up from 1.83% to 1.86%. On a positive note, the net interest margin even surprised on the upside with the number going up from 2.18% to 2.20%. In respect of potential NPL pressure, the additions are also considered with the balancing factor of quality factor, thus focusing banks with robust fundamentals but suppressed valuation during broad market drawdown. Automobile industry was a totally different story with the national sales strinking for the 2nd year in a row. The total vehicle sales fell by 8.2% to 25.8 million in 2019, after having slid nearly 3% in 2018 in the first contraction since the 1990s. The slump was exacerbated by weak economic growth, the trade war with the US and tough new emission standards introduced last summer.For Premia CSI Caixin China New Economy ETF (3173.HK) which has continued the strong trajectory and performed well through COVID and after the rebalancing with YTD ~20% return as of Jun 22nd, it had a higher turnover rate compared to the previous rebalances given the evolution of the new economy trends becoming more pronounced since COVID. There were total 113 replacements, and the one-way turnover was around 45.7%, slightly higher than the historical range of ~40%. As the index methodology prefers companies with light-asset business model, the consistuents showed a slight increment in non-fixed asset ratio from 0.857 to 0.859 post rebalancing. In terms of financial health, the updated basket of stocks reflected a higher quality in general with significant improvement seen in the debt coverage (0.86x to 1.71x), return-on-equity (9.7% to 12.6%), and profit margin (14.6% to 17.3%), representing a more robust set of fundamental staying power for growth given the current market conditions. In fact, this has also been reflected in the resulting strong growth numbers - the index constituents are expected to grow faster with the estimated revenue growth rising from 9.7% to 15.0% after the resuffle. A mid-teen growth rate is indeed impressive amid the macro slowdown and the challenigng COVID-19 impact.From a sector point of view, the major change is an increase in Information Technology versus a reduction in Healthcare and Consumer Discretionary. The additions in Information Technology were diversified into semiconductor, software and communications equipment, which align well with the new infrastructure and Industrial IOT development mentioned in our previous research articles. With the government’s intention to speed up the technolgoical advancement, it is quite rational to see more emerging industry leaders in the capital market. The latest policy expands the conventional infrastructural investment to encompass digital infrastucture aka #New Infrastructure such as 5G network, data centers, Internet of Things and cloud computing are expected to help groom the local champions. On the contrary, the deletions in Consumer Discretionary were mainly auto or consumer-electronic related since consumers were reluctant to make big ticket purchases in an uncertain environment. Besdies, the exports business might also get affected negatively from the rising tensions in global trade.Within Healthcare, the deletions focused on traditional pharmaceuticals which could face more headwinds ahead, in particular for the companies which produce generic drugs. Beijing has been pushing forward a system that requires drugmakers to go through a bidding process and cut prices low enough to be considered over generic copies if they want to sell their products at public hospitals via large-volume government procurement.For Premia Asia Innovative Technology ETF (3181.HK), there were 8 changes out of 50 stocks if excluding Alibaba which switches from the ADR to the shares listed in Hong Kong, due to its re-classification of the primary listing from the US to Hong Kong. Also, each stock is re-scaled back to an equal weight of 2% in the portfolio, following a rebalancing discipline of profit-taking and buying on dip. Among the 8 inclusions, there are 5 Chinese companies, 2 Japanese companies and 1 Korean company covering themes including new infrastructure, media & web services, biopharmaceutical and semiconductors. Only Chinese and Japanese companies are in the deletion list, in which their businesses are mainly related to media & web services, robotics & automation and industry 4.0. Most of the changes in the index were driven by whether the company’s market cap can reach or fall out from the top 50 in the universe.Similar to China New Economy, the post-rebalance portfolio reflects also a basket that resonates well in the COVID/ post-COVID world, where a lot of behavioural changes YTD become permanent phenomena. In terms of sector, although Technology remains the major components, there are some adjustments to the composition reflecting the impacts from the YTD environment. It has shifted some of its weightings from “electronic equipments and hardwares” to “new infrastructure and semiconductors”. The reduction in the former might be partly due to the shift in global supply chain as some multinational corporations have been moving manufacturing bases to the low-cost countries such as Vietnam and Indonesia. The increase in the latter was probablay a result of the policy direction in promoting the domestic competitiveness in technology. Certainly, the stimulus plan in allocating more resources in new infrastructrure also helps the stock performance. For the rest of other sectors like Healthcare, Consumer and Industrials, their respective weightings stayed around the same. The outcome is a diversified basket of innovative technology-enabled leaders across various growth themes, and across currently China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. Rather than high growth small cap companies or illiquid private companies, these are sector leaders with proven track record, R&D and growth fundamentals, and thus provide a more liquid exposure to the more resilient innovative technology players well positioned to capture the emerging megatrends including consumer and enterprise digital transformation, healthcare/ biotech/ pharmaceutical, and AI, 5G, robotics and industrial automations.

In crisis times like the current COVID scenario, when many stocks are at multi-year lows and finding opportunities seems to be challenging, our Premia Asia Innovative Technology strategy has proved to be among the most resilient large-cap thematic strategies that has rebounded well above the pre-COVID level with a YTD return of 7.1% (as of 6/12/2020) while also recently hitting an impressive record-high since its inception in August 2018. In this piece, we decipher for you this strategy’s exposures and why it is (more) relevant to investors, particularly post-COVID.

As cyclical movements would revert and short-term volatility hikes would calm, long-term strategic investors often look out for overarching secular or structural trends. Yet by definition, structural shifts and new innovations often take time. However, there can be catalysts! Witnessing a black swan can be a crisis, but like Winston Churchill advised – let’s not waste a crisis. So where do we look for growth opportunities?

随着联网汽车和智能家电等消费领域的应用日益普及，物联网（IoT，Internet of Things）已逐渐为人所熟知。 而在工业领域，正如我们一再强调与关注的话题——企业数字化转型将重写产业游戏规则，而工业互联网（IIoT，Industrial IoT）正是其中的重要环节。 事实上，工业互联网即是中国新基建七大重点投资领域之一，受到中国官方政策的大力支持。 所以，工业互联网是什么？ 为何其中的行业领导者在疫情期间更具弹性？ 在本篇文章中，我们将分享工业互联网的概念，以及该领域的发展进程和投资机会。

We previously highlighted the gaming industry just after the coronavirus outbreak in Account of an atypical, tech-enabled CNY holiday. With the COVID-19 pandemic raging on globally and people spend more time at home social distancing, the gaming industry has shown greater potential of booming opportunities. The large demographic base of tech-savvy and mobile-first youths born in the digital era provided a strong head start for China, especially in eSports.

疫情冲击下，中国推出40万亿人民币的＂新基建＂计划振兴当前经济，＂#新基建＂因而频频炒上热搜榜，点燃市场广泛关注及业界讨论。 ＂新基建＂到底为何？ ＂新基建＂概念股又该从何下手？

The coronavirus situation in China seems to have improved a lot, and now many are worried about what will happen as the factories get back on their feet. How's the progress so far?

On account of an atypical, tech-enabled start of the Year of the Rat, what are people doing during this very unusual Chinese New Year holiday period? While the roads are empty and quiet, we see extremely busy traffic online from social gathering and entertainment to post-holiday work arrangements all thanks to technology - which enabled an unconventional time of family reunion, and possibly fast-tracked development of enterprise digital transformation in the way.

2019 saw expensive asset classes get more expensive, a global yield back-up replaced by a yield rally, continued outperformance of DM over EM and Growth over Value (notwithstanding a few wobbles). As we approach 2020, we review market behavior during the last 12 months, the risk and opportunities going forward and make a few observations about trends that will dictate returns.

Investors like to conceptualize mega trends into investment themes, which fund managers use to identify strong companies based on top-down investment approaches with a focus on broader, macroeconomic themes. New investment themes always emerge from time to time, such as dot.com around the millennium, social media & robotics in the past decade, or sharing economy & artificial intelligence not long ago. What do they have in common? Technology! A sudden shift in technology would make transformative changes that redefine work processes, rewrite the rules of competitive economic advantage, and eventually the structural breakthrough will bring the potential output to the next level. That’s why market is interested to find out if 5G is a crucial investment theme.

Looking for a high conviction basket of Asia growth opportunities? We have a solution for you! Premia Asia Innovative Technology is a diversified, transparent, cost-efficient strategy capturing 50 Asia innovation leaders, and it is a basket of stocks favoured not only by analyst consensus but also many long-term investors including leading sovereign funds and private equity firms. Apart from the well-known BATJs, this vibrant region is also home to many other innovative companies such as the new e-commerce disruptor Pinduoduo and the photon technology evergreen Hamamatsu.

The World Economic Forum recently compiled the 2019 report of World’s Top Emerging Technologies. In this article, we will highlight 5 of the emerging technologies and share a few related examples of innovative companies in Asia. We see many Asian companies at the forefront of researching, developing and implementing world’s top emerging technologies. The global and regional megatrends such as aging population, growing middle class, green environment will also continue to drive technology advancements in order to enable more innovative and efficient solutions for the society.

3 of our ETFs recently went through their annual index rebalances. While investors focus mainly on fees and liquidity, the rebalancing and index methodology of ETFs are equally, if not more, important to the investor experience and returns. To that end, we’d like to highlight June’s rebalances and explain what investors can expect going forward.

The Global Mobile Communication Systems Association estimates that by the end of this year, 5G services will be available in 29 markets around the world, with 10 million connections. What is 5G and where do we see potential investment opportunities from this significant technology upgrade in Asia?

Nasdaq has made new highs and investors are understandably excited. Similarly, here in Asia we have seen innovative technology companies outperform YTD but with much less fanfare. David Lai explores the major megatrends in Asia and why you need to invest in tech leaders across this region.