April & May 2017 No 126, Volume 11
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
April & May 2017 - Volume 11, No 126 Tochal Mountain, Tehran. April 2017. Summary Equity Markets The Tehran Stock Exchange has made steady gains over the past two months, rising 2.0% in March and 2.9% in April in US$ terms. During the final month of the last Iranian calendar year (from 19 Feb to 21 Mar 2017), the market’s total trade value increased 91% compared to the previous month, from 1.1 billion US$ to 2.1 billion US$, while the number of shares traded rose 78% from 20 billion shares to 36 billion. Economic Review This issue reviews the economic performance, consumption value in GDP and trade balance in the Iranian cal- endar year 1395 (March 2016 to March 2017). In addition, we have included sections covering the latest macro- economic data published by relevant organizations and senior macroeconomic strategists in a factsheet report, as well as an economic calendar released by local and international statistics centres. 1 Iran Investment Monthly Table of Contents 3 Market Overview 3 Market Insight 6 Performance & Updates 8 Sector Insight 11 Company Overview 12 Market Snapshot 14 TSE & Junior Market Performance 16 Top Ranked Companies 18 TSE Statistics 18 FX Movements 20 Iran’s Fixed Income Market 24 Economic Review 24 Latest Updates 26 Macroeconomic Data 29 Turquoise Partners 29 About Turquoise Partners 31 News & Views 2 Iran Investment Monthly Market Overview Market Insight April & May 2017 - Volume 11, No 126 Rouhani: 4 More Years Results of the Iranian presidential election were announced on the morn- ing of Saturday 20th May and showed that the incumbent, Hassan Rou- hani, comfortably defeated his conservative rival with a winning margin of approximately 57% to 39%. Rouhani campaigned on the promise of a more open, prosperous, and internationally integrated economy, and that message appears to have been welcomed by the Iranian urban mid- dle-class and young population. During his election campaign, he pledged to secure the lifting of non-nu- clear sanctions that have remained in place. Rouhani will now have four more years to make incremental changes and, crucially, assign major oil and gas contracts. Shervin Shahriari Chief Investment Officer Despite the more organised opposition, the president won at least 4 mil- lion more votes than four years ago. The strong popular mandate Rou- hani received is promising in our view, both at home and abroad, boost- ing his ability to reduce tensions with the west and bring more foreign capital and economic growth to the country. We will discuss the market’s reaction to Rouhani’s re-election at length in next month’s newsletter. Market Insight Iran’s main stock market remained flat in March, but performed solidly in the month of April. The TSE Overall Index returned -0.2% and +1.4% in EUR terms in March and April respectively (as per our NAV calendar month). We are happy to report that our Fund delivered its third consecutive month of strong alpha, returning +2.6% and +3.3% in EUR terms for the B and C share classes respectively in March. The fund performance in April was just as solid, returning +2.2% and +2.4% in EUR terms for the B and C share classes respectively. Since inception at the end of 2015, the positive performance of both our share classes has surpassed that of the Index over the same period, with markedly lower volatility. Of particular interest is not only our outsized posi- tive performance since the start of this year, but also our ability to protect the portfolio during sharp market downturns. For example, in Q2 2016, our Fund returned +1% whilst the broader index was down almost 10%. 3 Iran Investment Monthly Market Overview Market Insight April & May 2017 - Volume 11, No 126 Comparative Performance: Rebased Index & NAV Net in EUR April 26, 2017 TSE Overall Index Class C Class B 130.5 124.6 124.3 Looking more closely at the drivers behind our portfolio’s strong perfor- mance last month, 2 out of the 3 industries with the largest weighting in our portfolio outperformed the broader market, where this is illustrated in the chart below: Rebased Index in EUR Overall Index Financial Index Construction Index Considering the cyclical behaviour of the property market in Iran, it is en- couraging to see this recent upturn, which is a strong indication of the be- ginning of a multi-year rebound. As such, we maintain our overweight expo- sure to carefully selected stocks in the Real Estate sector, where our picks returned +6% vs. the broader Real Estate sector which was up +3% in April. Justifying our strongly held view to be overweight the broader financial sec- tor, but underweight domestic banks, Financials Ex-Banks returned a very impressive +6% in April. This was predominantly driven by Investment Com- panies, which have benefited from broad strength in the overall market. Our decision to focus on Investment Companies that have recently been trading at a deeper discount relative to their NAV was vindicated in April, where Iran Industrial Development Company (IDIC), a 7% weighting in the portfolio, rose by more than +16% in the month. The Chemical sector also experienced a solid month where the sector gained approximately +2%. Attractive valuations contributed to the healthy performance of the sector, which still enjoys a P/E ratio of 5.8x and dividend yield of 14%. This compares favourably with the broader market’s P/E ratio of 7x and dividend yield of 11%. Additionally, our overweight exposure to 4 Iran Investment Monthly Market Overview June 2016 - Volume 10, No 116 this sector serves as a proxy hedge in a depreciating Rial environment, given much of this sector’s top line are in US$. In the run-up to the elections and given the strong YTD performance of many of our holdings, we took partial profits on select outperforming stocks. Whilst our base case was for a Rouhani re-election, we believed it was pru- dent to hold a little extra cash so that we had some available ‘dry powder’ to re-purchase some of our favourite companies at cheaper prices, should we get a pullback. Looking at our current portfolio composition, we are very happy with all our holdings and weightings. We believe that we have taken the right steps to mitigate our portfolio’s systemic risk exposure, and to continue to deliver strong absolute and relative returns for our investors going forward. 5 Iran Investment Monthly Market Overview Performance & Update April & May 2017 - Volume 11, No 126 Summary - March 2017 Market Capitalization (billion US$) 115 b$ TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Free Float 21% TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Number of Listed Companies1 564 TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Overall Index Performance (US$)2 2.0% (MTD) TSE Turnover (billion US$)2 2.9 b$ TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Dividend Yield (%) 3 11% TSE P/E 7× TSE 1 152 companies are listed in Over-The-Counter (OTC) or off-exchange market named as “Base Market” in Farabourse junior market which trading of these companies are done directly between two parties. 2 Calculated based on market IRR per US$ exchange rates. 3 Calculated based on market data ending 1395 Iranian calendar year. Summary - April 2017 Market Capitalization (billion US$) 118 b$ TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Free Float 21% TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Number of Listed Companies1 563 TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Overall Index Performance (US$)2 2.9% (MTD) 4.7% (YTD) TSE Turnover (billion US$)2 2.0 b$ TSE & Farabourse Junior Market Dividend Yield (%) 3 11% TSE P/E 7× TSE 1 152 companies are listed in Over-The-Counter (OTC) or off-exchange market named as “Base Market” in Farabourse junior market which trading of these companies are done directly between two parties. 2 Calculated based on market IRR per US$ exchange rates. 3 Calculated based on market data ending 1395 Iranian calendar year. Tehran Stock Exchange & Junior Market Trade by Value1 - March & April 2017 Iran Farabourse (Junior Market) Trade Volume (million US$) Tehran Stock Exchange (Main Market)Trade Volume (million US$) US$ Million Source: Tehran Stock Exchange Iran Farabourse Company All figures in US$ are converted from IRR at the free market rate 1 Trading volume month on month in US$ term - TSE includes mainly equity while Farabourse has more fixed income instruments and smaller equities. 6 Iran Investment Monthly Market Overview Performance & Update April & May 2017 - Volume 11, No 126 Performance & Updates The Tehran Stock Exchange has made steady gains over the past two months, rising 2.0% in March and 2.9% in April in US$ terms. During the final month of the last Iranian calendar year (from 19 Feb to 21 Mar 2017), the market’s total trade value increased 91% compared to the previous month, from 1.1 billion US$ to 2.1 billion US$, while the number of shares traded rose 78% from 20 billion shares to 36 billion. Iranian calendar year 1395 (21 March 2016 to 21 March 2017) In the Iranian calendar year 1395 (ending 21 March 2017), the average daily trading value stood at one billion shares or 61 million US$ equivalent. In terms of valuation multiples, the P/E of the automotive sector fell to 12× by the end of the year from an overvalued multiple of 27× a year earlier. Similar corrections in P/E ratios were seen in the Basic Metal, Fabricated Metal Products and Metal Ores Mining sectors. The overall market P/E stood at 6.8× at the end of the last Iranian calendar year, slightly above its 7-year average of 6.0×.