Aberdeen Standard launches new global equity AI fund

The fund embeds machine learning techniques within the investment process and will use a variety of quantitative techniques to time its investments. The investments will be based on'factor premia' - those sources of risk such as value, quality, momentum, small size and low volatility that can provide investors with persistent risk-adjusted excess returns. The Aberdeen Global Artificial Intelligence Global Equity SICAV, launched in Luxembourg, is a collaboration between Aberdeen Standard Investments' Quantitative Investment Strategies team and Mitsubishi UFJ Trust Investment Technology Institute (MTEC)/Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking Corporation in Tokyo, Japan – a centre of excellence in robotics, artificial intelligence and financial technology. Martin Gilbert, Co-CEO at Standard Life Aberdeen, said: "For active investment management firms, the ability to use machines to read and understand vast amounts of data in order to forecast market moves more accurately has spawned innovation and a resurgence in active quantitative investment approaches. "To benefit from this AI-driven innovation, and to complement our highly successful active fundamental strategies, we are proud to have collaborated with the MTEC – Japan's leading and most prestigious financial technology think-tank – and the Trust Bank to develop this active quant fund." Junichi Narikawa, president of Mitsubishi UFJ Trust Investment Technology Institute (MTEC), added: "This is the first time in MTEC's 30-year history where we have collaborated with an entity in Europe and are pleased to work with a world-class investment firm of the calibre of Aberdeen Standard Investments.