Fremont Global Fund

Overview Commentary Management Philosophy Process Performance

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The Fund employs multiple portfolio managers who specialize in distinct investment approaches. This “intelligence diversification” not only serves to manage risk, but also helps us tap the markets’ full potential by focusing different analytical insights on each class of investment. Fund management strives to achieve this performance and diversification while ensuring that the Fund operates within the framework of its investment objective and principal investment strategies.

Portfolio Construction

Bernstein Value Equities
First Quadrant, L.P.
Loomis, Sayles & Company, L.P.
Wellington Management Company, LLP

Bernstein Value Equities

The primary driver of Bernstein's performance is research-driven security selection. Portfolio management begins with a broad universe of all companies within the countries of the MSCI All Country World Index ex U.S. universe with a market capitalization greater than $750 million. The investment team screens this universe with a proprietary return model in order to identify the companies with the most attractive value attributes. The model derives an expected return for each company within the universe by assessing companies both from a global industry-based perspective and from a country-based standpoint, based on such factors as price to cash earnings, price to book, return on equity, and price momentum.

Ideal Company

The ideal company exhibits many of the following traits:

  • Strong fundamentals
  • Sound future business prospects

Portfolio Construction

  • Initial investable universe is comprised of all companies within the countries of the MSCI All Country World Index ex U.S. universe with a market capitalization greater than $750 million.
  • Investment team screens this universe with a proprietary return model in order to identify the companies with the most attractive value attribute
    • The model derives an expected return for each company within the universe by assessing companies both from a global industry-based perspective and from a country-based standpoint
    • Factors include price to cash earnings, price to book, return on equity, and price momentum
  • Analysts perform extensive research, focusing on the most attractively valued stocks
    • They then build detailed spreadsheets of historical and projected balance-sheet and income-statement information in order to estimate:
      • Normalized earnings power
      • Cash flow and asset values for each company for the next five years
    • Perform simulations to see the potential impact of changes in various financial-statement components
  • Analysts present their estimates and ratings for each security to the Research Review Committee of the Investment Policy Group (IPG)
    • The Committee challenges the analyst's assumptions and conclusions to ensure they are sound.

The Portfolio

  • Typically holds 30-85 stocks
  • Initial stock weightings are 0.5 - 3.5%
    • Maximum 8%

Sell Discipline

The following factors influence the sell decision when:

  • A stock has achieved Bernstein's forecasted target of fair value
  • A change the long-term earnings forecast reduces the price target to current market levels

First Quadrant, L.P.

First Quadrant, L.P. uses a proprietary multi-factor quantitative model to construct portfolios that combine a top-down analysis of market and economic conditions with a bottom-up stock selection process to enhance returns. The top-down analysis consists of a review of market and economic data to identify those industries and sectors of the U.S. economy that are likely to benefit from present and future economic conditions. The top-down analysis helps fund management determine how to tilt the portfolio relative to the benchmark in terms of style, market cap, and industry weightings. Individual stock selection, however, is driven by bottom-up models that focus primarily on

  • Market sentiment (Wall Street’s view of the security, management’s view of the security, investors’ view of the security)
  • Valuation (fund management is looking for stocks that are attractively priced), and
  • Accounting fundamentals (e.g. earnings quality, profitability, and growth).

Ideal Investment

The ideal investment exhibits some of the following traits at various times:

  • Positive corporate earnings revisions and earnings surprises
  • Good corporate earnings momentum
  • Reasonable liquidity

Portfolio Construction

Portfolio management:

  • Primarily invests in stocks that are constituents of the Russell 3000 Index.
  • Utilizes a proprietary quantitative model to identify stocks with the greatest expected alpha
  • Takes transaction costs and risk constraints into account
  • Limits industry exposure to +/- 8 percentage points relative to the industry weights of the Russell 3000 Index
  • Limits individual security weights to +/- 5 percentage points relative to the weight of the security with the Russell 3000 Index
  • Targets a tracking error of 8%

Sell Discipline

The investment team will sell a stock when:

  • It has become unattractive based on the proprietary model
  • Portfolio management deems that news about a company is a fundamental change not captured by the model
  • The stock leaves the benchmark, although management may take several months to trade out of the stock


Loomis, Sayles & Company L.P.

Portfolio managers Kenneth Buntrock, David Rolley, Lynda Scweitzer and the team of credit analysts at Loomis, Sayles & Company, L.P. ("Loomis") research debt offerings in the same way equity analysts research stocks, looking for undervalued bonds where they see a yield premium, the potential for price appreciation, or both. They analyze in detail the financial condition of individual countries and companies, as well as the terms of specific bond offerings. They believe price appreciation can come from a variety of catalysts including improving country or company fundamentals which would lead to credit upgrades, changing market supply and demand forces, improving sector or economic trends.

Ideal Investment

The ideal investment typically exhibits some of the following traits:

  • An attractive yield, both absolute and relative to Loomis’ credit research expectations
  • Good call protection (particularly when prevailing rates are low)
  • Stable or improving fundamentals (for corporate bonds)

Portfolio Construction

Portfolio management:

  • Seeks to identify attractively valued issues through fundamental research
  • Believes the greatest opportunity to add value is through accurately pricing credit risk
  • Analyzes stability and volatility of a country's bond markets, the financial strength of the issuer, current interest rates, and Loomis Sayles' expectations regarding general trends in interest rates
  • Employs bottom-up security selection approach
  • Ensures the average portfolio quality is Aa or higher

Sell Discipline

The investment team may make a sell decision when:

  • There is a change in sovereign, industry, or company fundamentals
  • The issuer is downgraded by Loomis research
  • Relative valuation is not consistent with its expected rating category
  • Other securities or sectors offer greater total return potential


Wellington Management Company, LLP

The initial investable universe for the investment team at Wellington Management Company LLP ("Wellington Management") is comprised of companies in the MSCI EAFE Index with market capitalizations greater than US$1 billion. These companies are researched by Wellington Management's global industry analysts who perform intensive ongoing fundamental research. Fundamental research consists of comprehensive company meetings, earnings modeling, and valuation analysis. The focus of this research is to update an ongoing assessment of management, current business challenges and aggregate industry trends. Thorough analysis is done in preparation for and following company contacts to ensure that "the numbers support the story": that the strategy and challenges outlined by management are coming through in financial results.

Ideal Company

The ideal company exhibits many of the following traits:

  • Identified earnings drivers
  • Above consensus earnings growth expectations
  • Multiple expansion potential
  • Reasonable valuation levels

Portfolio Construction

  • The portfolio typically holds 50-80 stocks
  • Cash levels are maintained at less than 10% of assets
  • Maximum of 10% is committed to any single holding
  • Active sector allocations are entirely built from stock selection
  • Country allocation is an implicit result of stock selection
    • Some consideration is given to ensuring country diversification
    • Emerging market exposure maximum of 15%

Sell Discipline

The portfolio management team may sell an investment when:

  • They see deteriorating earnings drivers or company fundamentals
  • Trend of earnings growth decelerates
  • They see limited upside potential left in the stock price


    Disclosure

    Investors should carefully consider the fund's investment objectives, risks, charges, and expenses before investing. For this and other information, please call 800.835.3879 or download a free prospectus. Read it carefully before investing or sending money.

    The performance shown represents past performance and is not a guarantee of future results. Current performance may be lower or higher than the performance data quoted. The investment return and the principal value of an investment will fluctuate so that an investor’s shares, when redeemed, may be worth more or less than their original cost. From time to time the advisor has waived fees or reimbursed expenses, which may have resulted in higher returns. The listed returns and yields on the Fund are net of expenses and the returns and yields on the indices exclude expenses. Current performance of the Fund may be lower or higher than the performance quoted.

    There is no guarantee that these investment strategies will work under all market conditions, and each investor should evaluate their ability to invest for a long-term, especially during periods of downturns in the market.

    The investment return and the principal value of an investment will fluctuate so that an investor's shares, when redeemed, may be worth more or less than their original cost.

    Downloadable Documents
    Quarterly Update 9/30/08
    Detailed Fund Statistics
    Holdings
    Prospectus
    Annual Report 10/31/08
    Semi-Annual Report 4/30/2008
    Statement of Additional Information
    More Forms and Applications
    Fund Pricing 01/08/09
    NAV: $9.46
    NAV $ Change: $0.07
    NAV % Change: 0.75%
    YTD Return (as of 12/31/08)
    - at NAV -36.52%
    Complete information is found on the Daily Pricing and Performance pages.
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