【英语中国】分析：中国小型股基金蕴含投资机会

If you read last week's column about my trip to China, you might think that I'm enormously bearish about Chinese stocks. And, to be fair, I'm not entirely convinced. In my view, a small single-digit allocation to Chinese equities will probably suffice – and you need to be careful how exactly you structure that investment. I suspect you need exposure to large caps through a cheap tracker fund, plus stockpicking funds operating in the consumer, clean tech and services sectors.

But I have now found a London-listed fund that invests in smaller, even earlier stage companies plus private equity deals in China and the rest of Asia.

It's called Origo Partners and has just announced a fundraising through the placing of new ordinary shares that will aim to raise $30m (£20.7m) to put into “well advanced investment opportunities”.

It's managed by Chris Rynning – a veteran China hand – and its approach is fairly unusual: private equity deals focused on small, private clean energy and resources companies that might move to an initial public offering (IPO), with some heavy bets on the frontier market of Mongolia. It sounds very risky but with the shares trading at a hefty discount to net asset value (NAV), a cash pile equivalent to a quarter of that NAV, and the likelihood of two big IPOs in the next 12 to 18 months, I think there is a decent margin of safety.

Most importantly, I like its boss's cautious approach. “I maintain a healthy scepticism regarding Chinese small caps and their founders,” says Rynning. “Unless you have a team of loyal accountants and lawyers on the ground performing due diligence and constantly monitoring the companies, small cap investing in China is an extreme sport that I would not recommend to the inexperienced. If you can master it, however, opportunities abound.”

This is exactly the attitude I would expect from sensible foreign- backed equity managers based in China. Corporate governance is still dreadful and one leading analyst I talked to said it was getting worse as more money flows in. Another fund manager told me that his desk drawer contains undated letters of resignation signed by the CEO and CFO of a Chinese company he invests in – in case it all goes pear-shaped and he has to grab control of his investment!

Even so, there's still lots of money to be made in China, mainly because the local banks won't lend properly to private small cap businesses in China – a hideous inefficiency that must be fixed in the long term. Also, the Chinese equity market is still growing at an extra-ordinary rate in volume terms and, on some measures, isn't hideously expensive. According to aggregate data from French bank Société Générale, the Chinese equity market trades at 11.9 times 2010 estimates for earnings, falling to 10.1 for 2011, with earnings per share growth of 29 per cent in 2010 and 17.9 per cent in 2011.

I have a strong sense that most growth will come through the small cap sector – and Origo's focus on clean tech companies, plus its growing stable of yuan-denominated venture capital funds, should be able to capture much of that upside.

Of course, all the talk of opportunity and geo-political potential must not blind UK investors to the risks of investing in small caps shares in some of the riskiest markets on earth. But I do find some re-assurance in Origo's near 40 per cent discount to NAV. A report in April by analysts at Liberum put the NAV at around 37p, with $24m or 7.5p in cash on the balance sheet, versus a current share price of 27p. Liberum, perhaps optimistically, reckons that Origo's stake in one company – Gobi – could even be worth 27p on its own if it lists this year or next.

Add in a likely IPO from an Australian farmland investment – RM Williams Agricultural Holdings – plus the possibility of more renminbi-denominated local equity funds in the pipeline (managed by Origo Partners for a fee), and I think there's some safety in the numbers.

如果你读了我上周关于中国之行的专栏文章，你或许会认为我极度看空中国股市。凭心而论，我并不是彻底看空。在我看来，向中国股票少量配置不足10%的资金可能已经足够；而且你还需要注意具体的投资结构。我猜测，你需要通过一只廉价的跟踪型基金来投资于大型股，以及涉足消费、清洁技术和服务板块的选股型基金。

不过，我现在找到了一只在伦敦上市的基金，它投资于中国及亚洲其它地区规模较小、甚至处在起步阶段的公司，以及该地区的私人股本交易。

这只名为Origo Partners的基金刚刚宣布，将通过配售新的普通股来筹集资金，目标是筹资3000万美元，投入“进展良好的投资机会”。

该基金由中国通克里斯•林宁(Chris Rynning)管理，其战略相当与众不同：以清洁能源和资源领域可能走向首次公开发行(IPO)的私营小公司为主要目标的私人股本交易，且在蒙古这一前沿市场进行了大举投入。听起来，该基金风险很高。但鉴于其交易价格相对资产净值(NAV)存在大幅折让，现金储备相当于资产净值的四分之一，未来12至18个月内可能迎来两宗大型IPO，我认为它还是相当安全的。

最重要的是，我欣赏其老板的谨慎态度。林宁表示：“我对中国小型股公司及其创始人持健康的怀疑态度。如果你没有一支由忠诚的会计师和律师组成的团队去现场进行尽职调查，并持续监控这些公司，那在中国投资小型股就是一项极具挑战性的工作，我不会建议新手涉足该领域。不过，如果你对该领域极为精通，那么机会还是很多的。”

这正是我期望的态度，是那些驻中国的理智的外资股票经理人应该具备的态度。中国的公司治理仍很糟糕。一位我曾与之交谈的一流分析师说到，随着更多资金流入中国，公司治理状况也愈发恶化。另一位基金经理告诉我，在他的办公桌抽屉里，有一家他所投资的中国公司的首席执行官和首席财务官签署的未注明日期的辞职信——万一出了乱子，他必须夺取这项投资的控制权！

尽管如此，中国仍存在很多赚钱机会。这主要是因为当地银行不会正常向私营小型股公司放贷——这一可怕的低效做法长期而言必须得到纠正。此外，中国股市的容量仍在以超乎寻常的速度增长，而且以某些指标衡量，估值还算不上高得吓人。法国兴业银行(Société Générale)汇总的数据显示，中国股市相对于2010年预期收益的市盈率为11.9倍，相对于2011年业绩的市盈率下滑至10.1倍；而2010年的每股收益将增长29%，2011年为17.9%。

我强烈感到，大部分增长将由小型股板块贡献——而Origo聚焦于清洁技术公司，加上旗下以人民币计价的风险投资基金不断增多，它应该能够在很大程度上抓住这波增长机遇。

当然，英国投资者千万不要被上述机会和地缘政治潜力蒙住双眼，以致看不到在全球某些风险最高的股市投资小型股的风险。不过，Origo交易价格相对资产净值存在近40%的折让，这的确让我感到有些放心。Liberum的分析师今年4月发布的一份报告估计，Origo的资产净值约为每单位37便士，资产负债表中的现金储备为2400万美元或每单位7.5便士，而当前的交易价格为每单位27便士。Liberum（或许有些乐观）估计，一家名为Gobi的公司如果在今年或明年上市，Origo仅在这家公司的股权，价值可能就已相当于每单位27便士。

此外，Origo在一项澳大利亚农地上的投资——RM Williams Agricultural Holdings——也可能会上市。Origo未来还可能推出更多以人民币计价的当地股票型基金（Origo Partners负责管理，并收取管理费）。我认为，投资者从这些数字中可以获得一些安全感。

译者/汪洋