Investment

Singapore-based investment managers are positioning China and Japan as their top Asian equity plays for 2026, favouring valuation-driven stock selection and income strategies as geopolitical risks reshape portfolios.

LGT Private Banking says investors entering 2026 face a regime shift where AI infrastructure bottlenecks, digital-asset volatility, and Asia’s uneven recovery demand more agile diversification.

An income approach fund under Singapore’s equity market development programme

Asian ultra-high-net-worth families are not reacting to market volatility or geopolitics. Instead, the growing dispersion of family members across jurisdictions is pushing wealth owners to rethink how capital is structured, governed, and reviewed.

Earlier this year, the firm bolstered its traditional asset management scale with the US$1.8 billion purchase of Macquarie’s U.S. and European public asset management businesses.

MA Financial Group is expanding its Asian footprint by targeting high-net-worth investors with real estate and private credit funds. Executives say winning trust through education and local expertise is key to their long-term strategy in the region.

The firm has partnered with fixed income specialists including Algebris Investments, Barings, Man Group, RBC BlueBay, and UBP Asset Management to implement the new strategies.

Key opportunities now lie in high-dividend stocks, investment-grade bonds, and a resurgent EM equity landscape—while gold is reaffirmed as a core holding in a structurally bullish cycle.

Leading asset managers are setting a cautious yet opportunistic tone for 2026, emphasizing a strategic pivot away from broad diversification toward more deliberate and selective exposures in private markets.

The fund will be managed by UBP’s DPM team in Singapore, providing clients access to a wide spectrum of asset classes.

The investment case for Asian equities is being rewritten by global AI infrastructure needs and the rise of local Gen Z consumers, according to Allianz Global Investors.

KBank's K WEALTH is deepening its alliance with J.P. Morgan Asset Management.