HwangDBS declares income distribution for structure income funds

HwangDBS Investment Management Bhd declared its first quarterly net income distribution of 1.50 sen per unit for the HwangDBS Structured Income Fund I and of 0.4842 sen per Unit for the HwangDBS Structured Income Fund II.

It said on March 24 the distribution translated to a 1.52% growth for the Structured Income Fund I and 0.49% growth for the Structured Income Fund II.

Unit holders registered as at Feb 23 for the first fund and March 20 for the second fund were eligible to the income allotment.

They were the first two funds in the HwangDBS IM series of two-year closed-ended income funds targeted at qualified investors, mainly corporate investors.

Its objective is to provide regular income distributions over two years by investing up to a minimum 0.20% of the fund’s net asset value (NAV) in cash and money market instruments.

The difference between both funds is in the maximum 99.8% asset allocation of the fund’s NAV. Structured Income Fund I invests up to a maximum of 99.8% in a structured note linked to the credits of a basket of high quality Malaysian companies.

Structured Income Fund II invests up to a maximum of 99.8% of its NAV in a structured product linked to a basket of high quality corporate bonds (local and/or offshore corporate bonds).

HwangDBS IM chief executive officer and executive director Teng Chee Wai said all of the three underlying referenced credits -- IOI Corp Bhd (IOI Corp), Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) and Khazanah Nasional Bhd (Khazanah) -- of the Structured Income Fund I’s structured note continued to meet their financial obligations as at end of January.

Of the three referenced entities, IOI Corp. was the focus due to the planned privatisation of its subsidiary, IOI Properties Bhd.

As for the Structured Income Fund II, all of the four underlying reference entities, IOI Corp., Hongkong Land Co. Ltd, CapitaLand Ltd and Hutchison Whampoa Ltd continued to meet their financial obligations as at March 17.

Of the four referenced entities of the StrlF II's structured product, IOI Corp. and CapitaLand were the focus over February and March due to the IOI Corp’s planned privatisation of its subsidiary, IOI Properties and CapitaLand’s rights issue.

Teng also noted that the other two underlying corporations Hongkong Land and Hutchison Whampoa continue to weather the current economic conditions and are widely expected to be amongst the few major corporations within its respective sectors to record a decent net profit for the year ending 2009.

Moving into the next quarter of 2009, Teng said HwangDBS IM would continue to monitor the economic environment and credit markets in respect of their effect on the referenced underlying credits of the funds’ structured product investment.

To date, all the referenced underlying have not shown any adverse signs of credit deterioration and Teng said HwangDBS IM remains confident that the underlying referenced entities will continue to meet their financial obligations in a timely manner.

Source: TheEdge Malaysia