At Kagiso Asset Management our aim is to consistently deliver superior investment performance for our clients. We achieve this through applying unconventional thinking to the assessment of financial markets and to the uncovering of great investment opportunities.
We are a specialist investment management firm based in Cape Town, South Africa. Founded in 2001, the company manages funds across the risk spectrum for sophisticated institutional clients and private investors.
Our ability to add value to clients arises from:
- our diverse team of experienced investment professionals
- operating a focused, alternative investment process
- our organisational environment, which encourages and enables clear, differentiated thinking
- applying our skill to portfolios that, within a South African context, are not constrained by size
Evidence of our skill - the results of our unconventional approach - can be found in our performance track record
Our firm's history
Kagiso Asset Management was founded as a joint venture between the Kagiso Group and Coronation Fund Managers.
We launched the Kagiso Protector Fund, an absolute return fund.
We launched our first equity unit trust, the Kagiso Equity Alpha Fund*.
*prior to 1 February 2009, the fund was called the Kagiso Active Quants Fund
Coronation Fund Managers exited our business and Kagiso Asset Management staff bought 30%.
Independent administration and infrastructure was installed and full operational independence from Coronation was established.
Our assets under management first reached R10 billion.
We were the proud recipient of the prestigious Micropal Fund Award 2008 for the Best Smaller Group in South Africa over three years. Furthermore, three of our funds won Micropal awards.
Our assets under management reached R17.7billion on significant client inflows. We launched the Kagiso Islamic Equity Fund, a Sharia-compliant fund.
» Experienced
We are a stable team of investment professionals with extensive investment experience. This experience we have gained both within Kagiso Asset Management and at our previous employers - large, successful investment firms.
» Skilled
A key strength of our team is that we draw on a diversity of formal training and academic backgrounds - from economics, finance and engineering to statistics, actuarial science and accounting. Combining these different skills enables us to generate a rich mix of investment ideas. We approach investment problems from different, sometimes unorthodox angles.
The combination of our investment experience and our diverse skills set contributes to superior investment thinking. Ultimately, this leads to excellent results for our clients.
It is essential for our investment professionals to have:
- an inner competitiveness to achieve superior investment performance
- a very strong intellectual ability and the drive to apply it deeply
- the intellectual courage to pursue original, unconventional thinking
- the confidence to be contrarian in our actions
- perspective and emotional detachment
- a flexible, curious and questioning orientation
» Roland Greaver
Chief Executive Officer
BCom, CA(SA)
Investment industry experience: 14 years
Roland was a founder of Kagiso Asset Management in 2001. After completing his articles at Ernst & Young in 1995, he joined Sanlam Investment Management as an investment analyst. In 1998 he was part of a team of investment professionals that founded Gryphon Asset Management.
» Gavin Wood
Chief Investment Officer
BBusSc, CFA, FFA
Investment experience: 14 years
Gavin was a founder of Kagiso Asset Management in 2001 and has headed up the investment team since inception. He also serves as executive director. Previously he was an investment analyst with Coronation Fund Managers.
» Abdul Davids
Head of Research
BCom, CFA
Investment experience: 12 years
Abdul joined Kagiso Asset Management in 2008 as Head of Research. Previously he was with Allan Gray as a senior investment analyst and portfolio manager for all clients in Botswana and Namibia.
» Our Philosophy
Opportunities arise when market prices deviate from intrinsic value
All investments represent a set of future cash flows, which can be valued with reasonable accuracy. The progression of this intrinsic value is fairly stable through time. However, investment market prices vary considerably over time - most often due to self-reinforcing cycles of enthusiasm or negativity.
The patient, skilled investor will benefit from buying investments at prices well below intrinsic value and holding them until they can be sold at above intrinsic value.
Statistical analysis provides valuable additional signals
Considerable advantage can be gained from processing company specific information rapidly and consistently into a form that has investment value. Well researched statistical tools can generate an internally consistent, objective framework for assessing expected returns from investments. They powerfully complement our valuation-driven approach.
The future is never certain
There is considerable danger in operating with the comfort of a false sense of certainty and the accompanying behavioral reinforcement cycles that lead to a distorted evaluation of new information.
Recognition that one's view may be incorrect and that one cannot know all the facts, drives one to think more deeply, to work harder and to be more alert. The future should be viewed in terms of probabilities, alternative scenarios should be explored, risk should be diversified and hedged and potential asymmetries should be sought.
» Our Process
While we cannot control our results, we can, and must, control our investment process if we are to succeed. We follow a 'bottom-up' process to exploit our investment philosophy in a disciplined, yet flexible manner - enabling creative and rigorous thinking.
Original research in pursuit of attractive investment opportunities
Most of our time is spent undertaking in-depth company, industry and individual security research. We aim to produce an accurate assessment of the relative merits of a particular investment and to identify the key drivers of its future cash flows. This then forms the basis for detailed financial modelling and the calculation of its intrinsic value.
We analyse relevant information to identify the sustainable, 'normalised' economics and cash flow generation potential of the investment. We attempt to understand structural and cyclical forces in operation, to adjust for temporary distortions to cash flows and to conduct analysis with the perspective of the long-term history of the business and industry.
Statistical analysis to assess shorter-term investment prospects
We run a regression-type statistical analysis on a monthly basis. This analysis dynamically weights company-specific metrics to produce return expectations, aiming to harness information in trends.
Portfolio management that optimises client outcomes
Our portfolio managers construct well-diversified portfolios, based on the investment opportunities uncovered by our proprietary research and analysis. They maintain a patient, long-term outlook, paying careful attention to risk management - minimising 'unrewarded' risks and positioning for asymmetric potential results.
We have organised our business to maximize our potential for delivering on our performance and service undertakings to clients.
Within this specialised investment management company environment, we aim to enable and incentivise our people to deliver their best thinking and output for clients. We aim to attract the best people to our firm.
We do this by:
- offering a narrow product range, focused only on areas where we believe we can excel for clients
- maintaining an aversion to unnecessary structure that may impede effective decision-making and operation
- outsourcing non-core functions, such as back-office administration and IT infrastructure maintenance, so that we can preserve a professional environment, focused on investment decision-making
- employing IT systems extensively to enhance efficiency and continually searching for areas for improvement and ways to operate smarter
Our people are all subject to performance-based remuneration, with performance incentives aligned to superior client value-add and long-term company objectives. In addition, senior employees own a substantial stake in Kagiso Asset Management.
The long-term performance track record of our various funds is proof of the ultimate effectiveness of our people and process.
To view our long-term performance track record, click here.
Kagiso Asset Management is a subsidiary of Kagiso Trust Investments (the Kagiso Group), the investment arm of the Kagiso Trust, which is a developmental NGO founded in 1985. The Kagiso Trust has a distinguished history of delivering social upliftment programmes to poor communities in South Africa and currently focuses its efforts on resourcing secondary schools and tertiary education funding.
For further information on our group structure click here.
