News

• Banca March has launched Dynamic Alternative Strategies through the Inversis platform. The fund delivers an alternative liquid investment opportunity by replicating a basket of the 50 largest alternative funds in the Event Driven, Equity Hedge and Relative Value categories, as well as 20 CTAs (Systematic global macro).
• The strategy has been designed by Banca March with advice from Dynamic Beta Investments (DBI), a US asset manager specialising in liquid alternative solutions which is part of the global asset management network IM Global Partner.
• The methodology deployed by this new product is highly innovative in the Spanish market, as rather than tracking an index, it replicates a basket of hedge funds, targeting equity-like returns.
• This launch will expand Banca March's range of non-traditional liquid strategies in partnership with global experts, adding to the alliance formed in 2019 with Banque Syz and Franklin Templeton / K2 to seek alternatives to fixed income.
• Dynamic Alternative Strategies has no minimum investment, offers daily liquidity and its target return is line with the target for equities.

Ainhoa Azpitarte, head of Fund Selection at Banca March, said: “In a less than encouraging landscape with rate hikes on the horizon, spreads at record lows and with equities set to outperform but not without volatility, alternative investment funds are a compelling option, as they allow for diversification with a highly liquid, inexpensive structure, investing in liquid derivative instruments that track the performance of a basket of funds.”

DBI, a member of IM Global Partner, advises on the strategy of the new product, launched through the wholly-owned Banca March subsidiary Inversis. It features an equally-weighted replica of a basket of the 50 largest Event Driven, Equity Hedge and Relative Value and another basket of 20 CTAs, leveraged to generate a supplementary return to equity investments. It is an innovative idea in the Spanish market, as it tracks a basket of hedge funds by investing in fixed income and equity indices, with a view to managing three fundamental risk factors: the lack of liquidity inherent to the structure of alternative funds, the concentration of managers, geographic regions and funds, and human bias in fund selection. This strategic combination affords Banca March customers access to a highly sophisticated product which was previously restricted to institutional and professional investors, and to secure stronger returns by harnessing beta, as opposed to the alpha generated through individual selection by fund managers.

Banca March and DBI have designed a solution which allows a single strategy to track a universe of hedge funds, with a view to harnessing the returns generated globally by these products and mitigate the potential volatility represented by each manager. Dynamic Alternative Strategies invests exclusively in futures on European and global fixed income and equity indices, as well as high-liquidity ETFs. To achieve its target return, which is in line with long term equity investment, the product is suitable for investors with an adventurous risk profile.