Fidelity extend marketing of Fidelity Active STrategy funds

Fidelity International has extended the marketing of its Fidelity Active STrategy (FAST) funds, a family of specialist active extension portfolios, to professional investors across Europe following the funds' conversion to UCITS III and completion of local market registration.

Thanks to their strong performances, the FAST Europe and FAST Japan funds have proved popular with many investors in the countries where they have been available through private placement. Conversion to UCITS III status, supported overwhelmingly by fund shareholders, allows Fidelity to offer these funds to a broader range of professional investors in more markets.

Since launch three and a half years ago, the €484 million FAST Europe Fund has delivered a return of 96.3%, net of fees, compared with a return of 44.1% from its benchmark, the MSCI Europe Index. Over the same period, the

JPY43 billion FAST Japan Fund has produced a return of 50.3% compared with 35.6% from the MSCI Japan Index.

Like other actively managed Fidelity equity funds, the engine behind the performance of the FAST funds is the group's stock research. But the managers of the FAST funds can also use derivative based leverage and synthetically short individual stocks, in order to pursue a more aggressive return for fund shareholders. In addition, they can invest up to 30% of the portfolio outside the benchmark on a gross long and short basis.

Alex Homan, Client Portfolio Manager says: "Fidelity's equity research produces approximately as many sell recommendations as buys. In a conventional fund, the best that a manager can do with a sell recommendation is not to hold the stock. The FAST range of funds allows the managers to pursue the sell recommendation with far more conviction by going synthetically short - providing the opportunity to make money from a falling share price.

"Since their launch in October 2004, the FAST range has delivered superior returns for their investors. They are the most dynamic funds in the Fidelity family of funds - they're our turbo-charged portfolios. We are now looking at expanding the FAST range, starting with a range of pilot funds including some with absolute return benchmarks."