Allianz Global Investors is launching a series of retail and institutional share classes for its Global Small Cap Equity fund.

Originally unveiled in June, the fund is now registered in a number of markets in Europe, including Austria, Finland, France, Germany, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the UK.

Allianz said the fund, managed by Andrew Neville, has made a total return of 28.46  per cent for institutional clients since its inception in March 2011 .

The fund aims to deliver long term capital growth and outperformance of the MSCI World Small Cap Index Total Return. The portfolio is an aggregation of four dedicated regional sub-portfolios of North America, Europe, Japan and Asia with fixed weightings to each area in line with the benchmark.

"Small caps often have an advantage over mid and large caps in this environment as they are able to finance their own growth, which means they are not as constrained by the effects of banks restricting their lending. They provide diversification benefits, as they are more risky and more volatile but offer higher returns. Combining them with medium and large caps is a way of diversifying a portfolio,” said Nick Smith, head of European retail sales at AllianzGI.