Nordea Capital Limited, a privately owned investment banking firm, on Wednesday launched its mutual fund, the Nordea Income Growth Fund, with the goal to preserving and enhancing shareholder value.

The Fund is initially offering 500,000 Shares to the public at a cost of 20Gp per share between 25 February, 2015 and 17th March, 2015 to raise GH¢100,000.00.

Launching the Fund, Dr Ato Essuman, said mutual funds help investors to generate better inflation-adjusted returns without time and energy.

Besides, he said, mutual funds help mitigate risks to a large extent, by distributing one’s investment across a diverse range of assets and offer a great investment opportunity to investors who have limited investment capital.

Dr Essuman said while every form of investment involved risk, skillful management, selection of fundamentally sound securities and diversification could help reduce the risk, while increasing the chances of higher returns over time.

He urged the fund managers to provide regular information about the current values of investments periodically along with their strategy and outlook to give investors a clear picture of the performance of their investments.

Dr Edem Bart Williams, the Chief Executive Officer of Nordea Capital, said NIGF offers a less risky option to investment, which will result in yielding high returns and growth in income without losing sight of best practices of fund management.

He said the firm is underpinned by the tenets of value addition with clear investment objectives to growing and preserving client assets and building trust with financial professionals.

Dr Williams said Nordea Capital develops investment products that are relevant to the market and designed to produce consistent, competitive investment performance.

“We deliver a broad range of investment strategies while focusing on operational excellence and technology enablement,” he said, adding that the company brings on board a unique customer service proposition and products that would differentiate it from the rest.

Ms Jennifer Akpo, the Head Asset Management, said the Fund’s objective is to preserve and enhance shareholders wealth by investing in securities to meet medium to long term financial goals.

She said the Nordea Income Growth Fund is a balanced fund with the objective of preserving and enhancing shareholders’ wealth to meet medium to long term financial goals, while creating liquidity to meet short term needs.

The fund will invest primarily in fixed income securities as well as equity securities listed on all organized stock exchanges, including the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) as well as unlisted equities.

Under normal market conditions, 50 per cent of the Fund’s net assets shall be invested in fixed income securities and the residual 50 per cent in equities.

The Fund seeks to provide long term income and capital growth, by producing returns commensurate with the risk levels, based on careful attention to detail, extensive forward planning and rigorous portfolio selection, she added.

Mr Alexander Williams, the Deputy Chief Executive, Securities and Exchange Commission, said the mutual fund market is growing with over 24 registered as at the end of 2014.

He appealed to the companies to educate the public on the products they have.