September quarter rocky: AMP

Fund managers AMP Capital Investors said September quarter returns had been rocky, led by a 7% rise in New Zealand commercial property, but the outlook was positive for some assets.

Wednesday, October 24th 2007, 6:27AM

Amid international market turmoil, hedged global shares and global property securities had negative returns for the three months ended September, AMP Capital head of investment strategy Leo Krippner said. They fell 0.7% and 1.1% respectively.

New Zealand commercial property posted a 6.8% return, followed by 6.5% from unhedged global shares which received a boost from the lower currency.

New Zealand equities returned 1.9% for the quarter, and 7.7% for the year so far.

For the year to date, local commercial property led with a 28.3% return, compared with global property's 0.4% return.

Hedged global shares returned 14.2%, and unhedged global equities were up 6.1%.

Shares would benefit from continued global growth, while diversified funds were also expected to perform well in future, Krippner said.

"The range of returns clearly illustrates the variability from asset class to asset class and from period to period. That highlights why it is important to maintain a diverse portfolio at each point in time and to remain invested for the longer-term," he said.

The best performing diversified fund for the quarter was the growth diversified fund, up 3.4%, followed by the conservative diversified fund (3.1%) and the balanced fund (2.5%).

For the year so far, the funds returned 10.6%, 7.1% and 9.1% respectively.

All returns were before tax.

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