The Fund's investment objective is to achieve long term capital growth by investing in a focused range of Japanese securities, including securities of Japanese companies which may be listed outside Japan.
The Japanese market has recovered from the recent low point in mid- March and posted one of the stronger gains among developed markets in May. However, the fundamental situation continues to deteriorate both domestically and with the operating environment overseas. Nonetheless, investors are reluctant to remain underweight in Japan indefinitely.One of the arguments for investing now is that inflation is rising in Japan, which is something not seen for many years. With inflation returning and long-term bond yields moving up, some investors believe that consumption will pick up.On the other hand, consumers are struggling to come to terms with the rising prices of daily necessities and wage increases are not keeping up with the rise in prices. Our contact with Japanese companies indicates that they are not facing undue wage pressures against a background where corporate profits are still not improving.For the Fund, there were no major transactions during the month. We did take some profits in Aeon Mall as the share price had run up substantially.
81.27p
