BRFI Blackrock Frontiers Investment Trust Plc

BLACKROCK FRONTIERS INVESTMENT TRUST PLC (LEI: 5493003K5E043LHLO706)

All information is at 31 October 2024 and unaudited.

Performance at month end with net income reinvested.

Sources: BlackRock and Standard & Poor’s Micropal

* 17 December 2010.

** The Company’s benchmark changed from MSCI Frontier Markets Index to MSCI Emerging ex Selected Countries + Frontier Markets + Saudi Arabia Index (net total return, USD) effective 1/4/2018.
 

*The Company’s yield based on dividends announced in the last 12 months as at the date of the release of this announcement is 4.6%, and includes the 2023 final dividend of 4.90 cents per share, declared on 30 November 2023, and paid to shareholders on 14 February 2024, and the 2024 interim dividend of 3.50 cents per share, declared on 31 May 2024, and paid to shareholders on 01 July 2024.

** Excluding 52,497,053 ordinary shares held in treasury.

***The Company’s ongoing charges are calculated as a percentage of average daily net assets and using the management fee and all other operating expenses excluding performance fees, finance costs, direct transaction costs, custody transaction charges, VAT recovered, taxation and certain non-recurring items for Year ended 30 September 2023.

**** The Company’s ongoing charges are calculated as a percentage of average daily net assets and using the management fee and all other operating expenses and including performance fees but excluding finance costs, direct transaction costs, custody transaction charges, VAT recovered, taxation and certain non-recurring items for Year ended 30 September 2023.

*reflects gross market exposure from contracts for difference (CFDs).

Market Exposure
 

Ten Largest Investments

Commenting on the markets, Sam Vecht, Emily Fletcher and Sudaif Niaz, representing the Investment Manager noted:
 

The Company’s NAV fell by 2.9 % in October 2024, outperforming its benchmark the MSCI Frontier + Emerging Markets ex Selected Countries Index (“Benchmark Index”) which returned -3.8%. For reference, the MSCI Emerging Markets Index was down -4.4% while the MSCI Frontier Markets Index returned -0.6% over the same period. All performance figures are on a US Dollar basis with net income reinvested.

Emerging markets fell by 4.4% in October as Chinese headline stimulus disappointed and worries on geopolitical tensions and tariffs post US election results. Emerging markets underperformed developed markets with the MSCI DM index falling by 2.0%. All EM regions finished lower in October: CEEMEA (-3.2%) declined the least, EM Asia (-4.6%) performed in-line with MSCI EM and LatAm (-5.1%) underperformed.

Security selection performed well in October 2024. The largest contributor to returns was our holding in Bank of Georgia (+8.5%), which Recovered post the election worry from the Georgian Dream victory. Another stock that performed well was Kaspi (+3.9%), the Kazakh e-commerce and payments platform, which reversed some of its September 2024 losses as concerns on the short investment report were allayed. Our financials exposure in various markets also yielded positive results, most notably through our holdings in commercial banks KCB Group in Kenya and MCB Bank in Pakistan. Both companies benefited from good third-quarter results, which beat analyst expectations.

On the flipside, Turkish commercial bank Türkiye İş Bankası (-16.6%) fell alongside the Turkish market and was the largest detractor over the month. Another detractor was our position in Ayala Land (-13.8%), the Philippine's based property developer. Carry countries, including the Philippines, suffered as rate cut expectations moderated from high likelihood of a Trump win in the US election, and fears of inflation risks from tariffs and bigger fiscal impulse pushed 10-year U.S. Treasury yields up from 3.78% to 4.28%. Indonesian retailer Mitra Adiperkasa (-13.4%) also hurt performance, erasing some of the September gains on back of a weak print outside of its apparel business in the third quarter.

We made few changes to the portfolio in October. We increased our exposure to the UAE by initiating a position in Emaar Development, the development arm of Emaar Properties. The stock is trading at attractive valuations especially given our view on continued strength in their ability to pre-sell new developments. We also took advantage of recent weakness to top up our holding in Frontken, a Malaysia-based company specialising in providing equipment services to the semiconductor industry, as we anticipate strong results from their biggest client to drive ongoing revenue growth for the company. Elsewhere, we exited Hungarian oil and gas company MOL as the stock reached fair value by our estimates.

We continue to see improving activity levels in some frontier and smaller emerging markets. With inflation falling across many countries within our universe, rate cuts have started to materialize in some countries. This is a good set up for domestically oriented economies to see a cyclical pick up. We remain positive on the outlook for small emerging and frontier markets, and we find significant value in currencies and equity markets across our investment opportunity set. Our investment universe, in absolute and relative terms, remains under-researched and we believe this should enable compelling alpha opportunities.

Sources:

1BlackRock as at 31 October 2024

2MSCI as at 31 October 2024

26 November 2024

ENDS

Latest information is available by typing www.blackrock.com/uk/brfi on the internet, "BLRKINDEX" on Reuters, "BLRK" on Bloomberg or "8800" on Topic 3 (ICV terminal). Neither the contents of the Manager’s website nor the contents of any website accessible from hyperlinks on BlackRock’s website (or any other website) is incorporated into, or forms part of, this announcement.