SINGAPORE: Singapore state investor Temasek, one of the world’s top funds, said on Tuesday it would prioritize investments in the United States after the “underperformance” of Chinese capital markets over the past year.

Temasek said its net portfolio value rose 1.8 percent in the financial year to March 31, with growth hit by sluggish Chinese markets. That compared with a 5.2 percent decline the previous year for one of the world’s top 10 investors. It said its net holdings stood at Sg$389 billion ($288 billion), up from Sg$382 billion.

Temasek was taking a cautious stance on China after that “underperformance”, while the United States would “continue to be the largest destination of our capital”, executives said in a presentation of the company’s financial report. It said the Americas region accounted for 22 percent of its global exposure, the largest outside Singapore, but did not give a breakdown for the United States.

“We have to position our portfolio for the future, bearing in mind the geopolitical environment as well as the relative competitiveness of each of the economies,” said deputy chief executive officer Chia Song Hwee.

“That’s the reason why... we talked about us allocating more capital to the different markets like the US at least in the next 12-18 months.” Png Chin Yee, Temasek’s chief financial officer, said it remained “underweight” in the US market.

“We see the US as a very deep market with lots of innovation. And so that’s a good place for our capital to be,” she said. Temasek, with a global footprint extending well beyond the city-state, said its one-year total shareholder return came in at 1.60 percent, reversing the negative 5.07 percent the previous year.

Its 10-year and 20-year returns were 6.0 and 7.0 percent, respectively. Temasek has stakes in companies such as Singapore Airlines and the city-state’s biggest lender, DBS Group. – AFP