Vanguard Group, America's number-two sized mutual fund company with $560 billion in assets, has made a foray into the Korean institutional marketplace by signing a memorandum of understanding with local Yurie Asset Management to distribute Vanguard's range of global index funds.
The tie-up will target high-net worth individuals as well as institutions.
The $700 billion Korean institutional market is pretty substantial, and is starting to move toward offshore investment but rather gingerly, says Jon Robinson, Vanguard Investments' managing director in Singapore. There is also some acceptance locally of index investing for Korea domestic securities.
Yurie has specialized in indexing and quant strategies for Korean institutions since its founding in...