RBS introduces commodity index product for retail investors in Australia
Published 03 Aug 2011 13:17 by media
Sydney, 3 August 2011
The Royal Bank of Scotland plc, together with global commodities expert, Jim Rogers has launched the
bank’s first commodity index product for retail investors in the Australian market. The RICI® EnhancedSM
Indices (“RICI Enhanced Indices”) offer a broadly diversified asset class covering 36 globally traded
commodity futures, ranging from agricultural and energy products to minerals and metals.
The RICI Enhanced Indices are a collection of composite total-return commodity indices designed to
provide optimised returns using different commodity futures curves and underlying fundamentals.
Investors are not exposed to AUD/USD movements with the product’s currency exposure hedged in
Australian dollars.
The RICI Enhanced Indices are unique as they adopt an intelligent approach to the rollover cycle,
underlying contracts diversification and roll yields which better represents the long-term fundamental data
of each individual commodity.
“The combination of RBS’ financial expertise and our alliance with Jim Rogers gives our clients an
advantage in terms of the markets they are able to access,” said Aaron Stambulich, Head of Structured
Retail Products.
“For many reasons, interest in commodities’ exposure continues to grow among investors and we’re
excited to now bring these enhanced capabilities to the marketplace where there is a demand to create a
more stable diversified portfolio through a commodities product offering with improved risk return,”
Stambulich said.
“With this index we provide a reliable and comprehensive benchmark for measuring the performance of
the global hard assets industry, which is central to the world economy,” Jim Rogers said.
“We think the bull market in commodities still has a long way to go, especially when you look at growth
rates in China, India, the MENA countries and throughout most of the developing world, where demand
for just about every commodity is rising at unprecedented rates while there are supply problems nearly
everywhere,” Rogers said.
Investors gain exposure to the RICI Enhanced Indices through “Exchange Traded Certificates” that are
securities listed on the ASX. The Exchange Traded Certificates will be listed on the ASX with a listing
date in late August 2011. The initial placement is being arranged with RBS Morgans.
