Manulife Philippines, the Philippine-subsidiary of Canada's Manulife Financial, has launched a new investment fund that maximizes exposure to Asia's top performing economies.

The ASEAN Growth Fund is a variable life insurance investment-linked fund and is designed to generate long-term capital growth for its Affluence Max, Affluence Max Gold and Affluence Builder Series clients. AGF is available as a fund allocation option with a minimum investment of $12,500 for Affluence Max Gold and $400 for Affluence Builder, the single-pay and regular-pay US-dollar denominated products, respectively. 

The fund aims to bank on what firm calls are under-appreciated growth profiles in Asia that are, as a result, under-priced by the market.

"We look to invest in companies that can achieve re-rating and increase their market capitalisations based on a combination of factors, such as market leadership, superior growth profile and low valuation," said Kenglin Tan, senior portfolio manager at Manulife Asset Management.

Despite concern over the "fiscal cliff" in the US, the Philippines and Thailand emerged as the best performing stocks in Asia, with the Philippine Stock Exchange Ps Ei index climbing 24.7 per cent year-to-date and the Stock Exchange of Thailand SET index growing 24.8 per cent. The ASEAN's fastest-growing economies are said to have doubled their aggregate gross domestic products over the past half-decade to around $2 trillion for 2012.