Standard Life awarded public distribution status in Germany

Standard Life Investments, the global fund manager, today announced that it has received public distribution status in Germany for its Luxembourg-domiciled SICAV fund range, allowing German investors access to its Global REIT Focus Fund and other strongly performing funds.

The Global REIT Focus Fund (ISIN: LU0277137690) 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 Global REIT Focus Fund offers European investors unique access to global property markets and the ability to diversify their 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 launched in the UK in 2005. The Global REIT Focus Fund employs largely the same rigorous investment process to ensure the prospect of strong returns.

The SICAV range also consists of a further 15 sub funds offering investors access to equities and bonds on a global basis. The equity funds include the Asian Equity Fund, the China Equity Fund, the European Equity Fund, the Eurozone Equity Fund, the Global Equity Fund, the Japanese Equity Fund and the US Equity Fund. The bond funds consist of the Euro Government Bond Fund, the Euro Inflation Linked Bond Fund, the European Corporate Bond Fund, the Global Bond Fund, the Global Inflation Linked Bond Fund, the European High Yield Bond Fund, the European Extended Duration Fund and the European Government All Stocks Fund.

With assets under management of €196.1billion Standard Life Investments is a major player in equities, fixed income, real estate, private equity and cash. SLI was launched in 1998 as a stand alone investment house from its parent Standard Life. During that time it has grown its third party assets from €7.9bn to €57.1bn (as at 31.12.06).

Standard Life Investments manages €21bn in global real estate assets and has been ranked as the 11th largest property investor in the world. In 2006 SLI was named 'Property Manager of the Year 2006' at the Professional Pensions Awards.

Gabriele Schlitt, Investment Director – European Business Development, Standard Life Investments, said:

“We’re really looking forward to introducing our fund range to German investors. Both institutional and retail investors will now have a tax efficient and transparent means of accessing our equity, bond and real estate expertise.

“I’m particularly confident that the Global REIT Focus Fund will appeal to a great number of German investors – either those looking to gain exposure to global property markets for the first time or seeking to diversify their existing property portfolios.


“The availability of our SICAV range – for both institutional and retail investors – will complement our overall strategy of increasing European wholesale activities, an area where we have been progressively successful in areas such as Benelux, the Nordic region and Iceland.”