Alliance Bernstein has launched an open ended investment company fund focused on European equities, as the global investment house expands further into the European market.
The ES AllianceBernstein Europe (ex UK) Equity Oeic is managed by Tawhid Ali and Andrew Birse.
The managers pursue an active, bottom up stock and security selection approach and evaluate the environmental, social and governance criteria of each company to assess both risk and opportunity.
The portfolio consists of 40-60 holdings and the company likened the investment team's approach to a "private equity-like mindset", meaning they apply an internal rate of return on each stock, while also collaborating with analysts across the regions.
Mr Ali said: "Political risks are driving market anxiety and accentuating mispricing, causing European investors to pay an unusually high premium for perceived safety.
"We approach investing as business owners developing a differentiated perspective on companies’ future cash flows and buying them at prices that offer attractive returns.
"We believe these market conditions provide investment opportunities for a rigorous stock selection approach and disciplined business owner process to win out."
Jamie Hammond, chief executive of Alliance Bernstein EMEA, added the company was eyeing further Oeic launches in the UK.
He said: "Our European equity team has been running its strategy with an impressive track record for over eight years as a Luxemburg Sicav structure.
"As UK investors traditionally have a large home allocation, a tailored Europe (ex-UK) strategy meets the needs of the UK market better and we already have clients interested in our approach.
"We have launched this fund in a UK domiciled Oeic structure to meet this demand and aim to add further Oeic structures for the UK market soon which, we believe, provide a real differentiating approach for UK investors."
Alliance Bernstein operates globally and currently has $547bn (£415bn) in client assets under management.
In Europe the company has 12 offices in 11 countries offering equity funds, specialist fixed-income strategies, liquid alternatives and multi asset solutions to institutional investors, discretionary wealth managers and financial advisers.
carmen.reichman@ft.com
