Blackrock UK Absolute Alpha

wombat42_2

This fund is designed to never go down and it doesnt seem to have so far. It returned about 10% last year. So is it effectively as safe as a cash savings account ?

http://www.h-l.co.uk/fund_research/security_details/sedol/B11V7T6.hl

mr_fishbulb

If you click on the chart on that link , it shows that it was down in 2006

spalding

All funds hope never to go down, its a real bad one if thats the plan!

purch

So is it effectively as safe as a cash savings account ?

................err No !!!!!!!!!!! :eek:


An Absolute Return Fund is designed to provide a positive return under any market conditions. In order to achieve this is has the ability to use instruments and methods which most UT/OEIC previously couldn't.

I would say that this freedom potentially makes this Fund a lot riskier than it may seem. If they get it right they will be able to create am Absolute return, if they get it wrong they could easily lose a lot.

I put money into this fund when it was launched, and I am keeping a very close eye on it. I'm not completely sold on the idea, and I don't think anyone can make a real judgement until the fund has operated for a much longer period, and in differing market conditions.

Liz_the_Whizz

wombat42 wrote: »

This fund is designed to never go down
http://www.h-l.co.uk/fund_research/security_details/sedol/B11V7T6.hl

So was the Titanic;)

[Deleted User]

wombat by switching funds everyday pretty soon youll have nothing left

read "the intelligent investor" by benjamin graham

wombat42_2

Yant1 wrote: »

wombat by switching funds everyday pretty soon youll have nothing left

read "the intelligent investor" by benjamin graham

1/ Many of my fund switches have cost nothing via H&L
2/ I was considering moving some cash savings into Blackrock UK Alpha but have now decided against it. But it may be an idea to switch my S&S into Blackrock UK Alpha as a relatively safe haven when running up to retirement age.

munk

I personally really like this fund and I'm in danger of becoming too attached to it to be honest! Recently I've switched around 25% of a (cautious) portfolio over into it because it's one of the very few uk based funds that have managed to weather the storm over the last 3 months and managed to do that with very little volatility - I'd estimate around 2% max volatility over last 3-6 months anyway.

Of course as purch(?) said above it's too early to assess it's performance over all types of market conditions, but for my money it's certainly weathered the market downturn very well and consistently gone up in value when all hell is breaking lose around it.

Definitely not a cash savings account, but not much more volatile than a low risk uk corp bond fund and with a lot better returns than said corp bond funds of late. Keeping a very close eye on it nonetheless though just in case the story changes.

You might be interested to look at the fund's chart on the bloomberg site, the rate of change (toggle it on) for the fund tells the story well:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/cbuilder?ticker1=MLUKAAP:LN

you can see how the volatility of the fund has calmed down markedly from September 2007 onwards - what the reason for this is I'm not sure, could be a change in strategy ... whatever it is it seems a marked improvement.

I found some extra info on the blackrock site useful when researching this fund - marketing stuff mainly but some interesting info also:

http://www.blackrock.co.uk/uksite/intermediaries/marketing/absolute-alpha.htm

There's a webcast of the manager mark lyttleton talking about the strategies employed by the fund here:

http://mediazone.brighttalk.com/comm/conjecture/4848dfb6a1-5572-945-5255%20