European Smaller Companies SICAV celebrates 1st anniversary

Standard Life Investments, the global fund manager, is celebrating the first anniversary of its €35m European Smaller Companies Fund which has, despite challenging market conditions, produced top decile performance over both six months and year to date.

Structured as a sub-fund which forms part of SLIs Luxembourg-domiciled SICAV range (see notes to editors), the fund invests in a diversified portfolio of European smaller companies. Aimed at both European institutional and retail investors, it consists of a high-alpha, unconstrained portfolio of 40 to 60 'highest conviction' stock ideas, offering investors the best opportunity of gaining from the untapped potential of Europe's smaller companies.

Ken Nicholson, Manager of the European Smaller Companies Fund, said: "The European smaller companies sector is worth around €1,449bn and with over 1350 companies in over 20 sectors and 16 countries, it has so much to offer investors - most especially those with a medium to long term investment view. A lot of the companies in the sector are under-researched and are world leaders in what they do.

"The fund has not completely avoided the recent wider market decline but it has outperformed, largely due to its focus on high-quality growth companies. Current market conditions offer up a great opportunity for buying into companies at very attractive valuations. Take Gemalto for example, the French smart card company, which is up by over 20%; Grifols, the Spanish blood plasma company, which is also up by over 20% and Abcam, the antibodies company, which is up by over 50% - all since the beginning of January 2008. (Source: Bloomberg)"

Jacqueline Kerr, Head of Mutual Fund Investments, Standard Life Investments, said: "Investors in SLI's UK Smaller Companies Fund have enjoyed over a decade of outstanding performance and we believed last year was the right time to extend this experience into the European small-cap arena for the benefit of our investors.

"SLIs' award-winning Smaller Companies team has over 50 years experience of researching smaller companies and an invaluable insight into and access to this sector. I am confident that this insight, the proven capability we have in European Equities and the robust, repeatable and well-proven investment process we have in place at SLI, will continue to benefit investors in the European Smaller Companies SICAV Fund."