The investment manager expects the ratings on its funds to be reinstated within this quarter.
Aberdeen Asset Management expects its fund ratings to be reinstated soon despite research house concerns about the impact of a key staff departure.
"We are hopeful to have the bulk of them reinstated within this quarter," Aberdeen Asset Management head of Australia Brett Jollie said.
"Those discussions are ongoing, but that is certainly our aim."
A number of research houses put the former Credit Suisse Asset Management (CSAM) funds, which in Australia consist mostly of fixed income funds, on hold following the firm's acquisition by Aberdeen.
Once the funds are taken off hold, Jollie said he expected strong inflows into the products.
"We believe we have got one of the best fixed income teams in Australia," he said.
"We've got a very strong and disciplined investment process that, we believe, has only been enhanced by the integration of Credit Suisse. We are positive that those ratings will be reinstated as they were previously."
Standard & Poor's (S&P) has hold ratings on a number of funds, including Aberdeen's Australian and international fixed income funds.
"We are currently in the middle of our FI (fixed income) and AE (Australian equities) reviews, and the vast majority of the Aberdeen funds will be revisited as part of these reviews," an S&P spokesperson said.
The fixed income report is due to be released in February or March, the spokesperson said, which could mean the funds come off hold this quarter.
Van Eyk is also conducting a review of the fixed income sector, of which the Aberdeen funds are a part.
But van Eyk head of research Nigel Douglas said he was more concerned about how the imminent departure of Aberdeen head of Asian equities and founder of the firm's Singapore office Peter Hames would impact on the Asian funds on offer in Australia.
"We've got a team of analysts in Asia looking at the fund and that will also give us a view on their other funds - the emerging markets fund, for example," Douglas said.
Aberdeen has largely completed the integration of the former CSAM business and expects to achieve cost efficiencies as a result of the completion.
"The consolidation is largely done. [Last year] was largely a year of consolidation. It is now behind us. The building blocks are now in place for growth. We are very positive for this year," Jollie said.
Jollie said he did not expect to launch any new products this year.
"We are quite happy with the products we have right now," he said.
The two non-consecutive alphabetic letters encountered most often last week caused more controversy than the underlying policy they represented, Wouter Klijn writes.... read more »
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