Franklin Templeton Investments
Franklin Templeton Investments is a global investment management organization headquartered in San Mateo, California. As of 31st January 2008, Franklin Templeton Investments manages over $605.2 billion in assets for over 20 million shareholder accounts worldwide. Franklin Templeton Investments is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (BEN) and is included in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index.

Franklin Templeton Investments marked its first presence in Singapore with the opening of a research office in 1990. In 1992, Templeton Asset Management Ltd. was officially incorporated and it has since grown to become Franklin Templeton’s global centre for emerging markets fund management. In 1996, a Sales & Marketing office was set up to create and distribute unit trusts locally. The Singapore Sales & Marketing office became the regional hub for Asia in 1999.

Investment Philosophy
At the core of Franklin Templeton Investments are multiple world-class investment management groups – Franklin, Templeton and Mutual Series – each operating autonomously and offering clients their unique perspectives for 60 years.

Franklin – The Foundation Builders
Founded in 1947, Franklin is a recognised leader in fixed income investing and also provides expertise in growth and value-style U.S. equity investing. Franklin’s equity funds follow a bottom-up research, while most of Franklin’s fixed income funds share a core philosophy of seeking to provide the highest level of income consistent with prudent risk.

Templeton – The Global Experts
Founded in 1940, Templeton pioneered international investing and, in 1954, launched what has become the industry’s oldest global fund. Templeton’s management follows a bottom-up, value-oriented, long-term approach to identifying bargain stocks worldwide, and still firmly believes that by searching worldwide, more bargains and better bargains can be found than by studying only one nation.

Mutual Series – The Value Purists
Founded in 1949, Mutual Series is dedicated to value-investing, seeking to identify businesses whose true value has gone recognised by the market and to purchase stocks of companies at a sizable discount to their intrinsic value. Mutual Series is also recognised for its expertise with distressed securities and merger arbitrage. While typically accounting for a small portion of the portfolios, these areas have historically helped lower overall volatility.