11 July 2004	Sunday	22 Jamadi-ul-Awwal 1425

KARACHI, July 10: Unit Trust of Pakistan (UTP)-managed by ABAMCO Limited-declared stock dividend at 30 per cent for the financial year 2004, which represented the highest return amongst all open- end balanced funds in the country.

Chief executive of ABAMCO, Najam Ali said at a press conference on Saturday that the group's UTP-Islamic Fund (UTP-ISF) declared stock dividend at 17 per cent, which together with appreciation in the Fund's Net Asset Value (NAV), produced total return of 26.43 per cent for the year ended June 30, 2004. "This again is the highest return among all open end Shariah Compliant Funds in the country," Najam said.

He stated that during the year the Asset Management Company had successfully launched the ABAMCO Composite Fund, which was Pakistan's largest ever closed end fund that had made the Initial Public Offering (IPO) in the staggering sum of Rs1 billion. The ABAMCO chief executive disclosed that International Finance Corporation (IFC) was considering investment of $5 million in the ABAMCO Composite Fund. It may be noted that IFC is one of the major shareholders in ABAMCO; others being Jahangir Siddiqui & Co. Ltd; AMVESCAP plc; MCB and Saudi Pak Commercial Bank.

"The Funds managed by ABAMCO Limited have grown by 154.6 per cent to a size of Rs14.03 billion during fiscal year ended June 30, 2004," said Najam, adding that the achievement was through a huge appreciation of NAV per unit as well as the growth of 103 per cent in the number of unit in issue of the three open end funds.

Explaining the performance of its various funds, the company's CEO said that for the fiscal year 2004, UTP, UTP-Income Fund (UTP-IF) and UTP Islamic Fund (UTP-ISF) had declared stock dividends at 30; 6.2 and 17 per cent, respectively. "The (stock) dividend of 30 per cent by UTP is the highest ever in the six and a half year's history of its operations and implies a distribution of more than 100 per cent of the net realized profits of the year," said the ABAMCO CEO.

He observed that after the appropriation of stock dividend, the NAV of UTP units work out to be Rs7,099 on June 30, 2004. Najam elaborated that stock dividend at 30 per cent implied that UTP's unit holders would receive additional 0.211 units for every single unit holding of UTP.

Those extra units also incorporated an added return of Rs152 as on July 9, 2004, that has already accrued to those investors because of the 2.14 per cent (87 per cent annualised) appreciation in UTP's NAV that occurred during the period June 30 to July 9, 2004.

The company CEO stated that for UTP-ISF, the bonus units included an appreciation of 3.13 per cent (127 per cent annualised) in its NAV, accrued to investors during the nine days of the book closure period.

In respect of overall performance of UTP, the ABAMCO CEO said that net profitability had also been at its historic high at Rs445 million, translating into Rs1,158 per unit. Including the unrealized gains, net profit stood at Rs600 million, which worked out to be Rs1,563 per unit. Like wise, the net earnings of the other two funds, viz. UTP-IF and UTP-ISF showed a healthy growth of 109 and 92 per cent, respectively and were recorded at Rs75.52 million (earnings per unit of Rs 32) and Rs 134.5 million (earnings per unit of Rs 145.15), correspondingly.

The company chief observed that ABAMCO Limited was the only rated Asset Management Company in Pakistan, where its intrinsic Rating by PACRA had been re-affirmed at "aa". It denoted an excellent capacity to master the risks inherent in asset management.

"The ratings of UTP andBSJS Balanced Fund have also been reaffirmed at "AA(f)" for the third consecutive year running and denote a capacity to consistently perform better than its peers with a strong capacity to respond to future opportunities and stress situations," the ABAMCO CEO concluded.