Asset Management
Constant drive for development. Karoll is a leading asset manager in Eastern Europe employing highly skilled and experienced professionals. The knowledge we have acquired since 1993 has allowed us to build outstanding research capabilities, state-of-the-art risk management and personal relationship attitude. All this combined with the superior level of our customer service brings the stability and prosperity that you need in asset management.
Trusted international partners. Erste Bank is our information agent and fund distributor for Austria. Our funds are monitored by Lipper, a Reuter’s fund rating agency. We work with reputable clients and partners from all over the world. All this brings us confidence and trust.
Special focus on South Eastern Europe. We believe these markets offer excellent investment opportunities as they are still at their initial phase of development.
Long-term prospects. The economies of Eastern Europe continue to converge towards the more sophisticated Western economies. GDP growth has been substantial in the last few years, foreign direct investment had continued to grow at a steady rate, and at the same time EU laws and legislation are constantly applied and incorporated.
Regional expertise. It gives us an edge in analysing the economies of Eastern Europe. Due to our location we can access information quickly and easy as we visit companies on regular basis.
Unique products. Our funds include different countries and follow separate investment strategies. We offer a diversified range of products based on the client needs and perspectives. In our analysis we use both bottom-up and top-down approach, and combine fundamental analysis with statistical models.
Investments in Eastern Europe only. Thus we gain maximum exposure to these emerging markets. Unlike other asset managers, we do not invest in companies that are based outside Eastern Europe and only generate some of their revenue in the region.
Thorough analysis of the company fair value. We take into account the company’s ability to realize an internal rate of return greater than the cost of capital, the management abilities and qualities, the sector dynamics and regulations, and the company’s position in the market. It is important that in our research we make on-site company visits.
The fair value of the company is derived by looking at future cash flows and evaluating financial indicators of other close competitors. We also consider investors’ psychology and order flows coming from large institutional investors.
Disciplined and well structured investment process. The fund manager is supported by a four-member investment committee in making the investment decisions. The committee mainly decides on the asset classes comprising the portfolio and the sector splits and restrictions. In addition our analyst team supports the fund manager in the active management of the portfolios.
Initiative. We are often the first to introduce new financial products and schemes in the region. We launched the first domestic equity mutual fund in Bulgaria in 2004 and a real estate investment trust a year later. We are the first local asset management company to organize road shows abroad and seek foreign capital.
No particular index followed. This gives us more flexibility in our investment choice. However, in order to measure our success we construct in-house indices to be used as a benchmarks, which are much closer to our investment strategy.