Frontier investing has become one of the buzzwords of the financial scene in recent years as investors search for markets that are less developed than the more established emerging markets. And Morgan Stanley Investment Management is the latest firm to join the trend with the launch of a fund playing to this frontier theme.

Morgan Stanley’s fund has raised $142 million, it said and will be listed in New York.

The fund will hold equities from about 30 countries that qualify as frontier markets, such as Botswana, Bulgaria, Croatia, Ecuador, Kenya, Kuwait, Namibia, Macao, Mauritius and Panama.

Other firms to have rolled out such funds include Progressive Asset Management, Barclays Global Investors and Franklin Templeton.

Morgan Stanley said its fund will, under normal circumstances, invest at least 80 per cent of its net assets in equities.

The fund's assets are managed within Morgan Stanley Investment Management's Emerging Markets Equity team. Current members of the team who are responsible for the day-to-day management of the fund are Ruchir Sharma, a managing director of Morgan Stanley Investment Management, and Tim Drinkall, an executive director of Morgan Stanley Investment Management.

The fund will concentrate its investments in the banking industry and, although it currently intends to invest less than 25 per cent in a single country, the fund has the ability in the future to concentrate its investments in one country, Morgan Stanley said.