Duet Group, an alternative asset manager, has announced the launch of a UCITS version of its Duet MENA Horizon Fund, a long only equity fund focusing on investment opportunities in listed equities in the Middle East and North Africa region. 

Hedi Ben Mlouka, Founding Partner and CIO at Duet said: "We are glad to have launched a UCITS version of our existing Duet Mena Horizon Fund. The Fund will leverage Duet's regional infrastructure and on-the-ground resources which have catapulted Duet to a position of key player in the investment management space in the Middle East and North Africa region.”

“The Fund team's track record is testament to its ability to generate returns in different market environments and reflects its deep understanding of the impact of local and global factors on the opportunity set and expected returns,” he said.

The UCITS fund will mirror the SIF fund that Duet has been managing since May 2011, which delivered around 20% annualized returns and a cumulative out-performance of approximately 66% from inception to end of 2014.

The Fund will be managed by the existing investment team at Duet, led by CIO Hedi Ben Mlouka and fund manager Ali Al Nasser.

The fund's strategy will deploy a combination of thematic idea generation and bottom up stock picking to generate a high conviction top ideas portfolio in the MENA region.

Ali Al Nasser, fund manager at Duet said: "MENA markets now represent less than 2% of most emerging market indices. We expect that to grow substantially in the coming few years, with improved accessibility, an increase in primary market activity and continued improvement in the corporate governance framework being key drivers.”

This is the seventh sub-fund of the Palaedino UCITS Platform, a Luxembourg SICAV established in November 2009.

Alessandro Mauceri, Chairman of the Palaedino Fund Board, said: “We are excited to on-board Duet MENA Horizon as a new fund on our UCITS umbrella. The investment manager is well-recognized for its regional investment expertise, resulting in top quartile returns for its SIF fund.”

“We are delighted to enter into this collaboration which marks a new milestone as this is the first emerging and new frontier markets strategy to be plugged into our UCITS umbrella.”