The asset management business of Switzerland's UBS has added to its range of fixed income exchange-traded funds.

UBS Asset Management has listed an exchange-traded fund on the London Stock Exchange to offer investors exposure to sovereign and quasi-sovereign bonds from more than 60 emerging markets.

The UBS ETF (LU) Barclays USD Emerging Markets Sovereign UCITS ETF, which will carry a total expense ratio of 0.42 per cent, will provide access to US dollar-denominated government debt issued by emerging economies.

The index currently comprises more than 100 securities. Investments in a single emerging market country may not exceed 3 per cent. Illiquid market segments are removed via a stringent liquidity filter, providing investors with transparent and flexible access to emerging market government bonds, the firm said.

“The underlying index the ETF tracks provides a more balanced set of country weightings than an un-capped index of this sort. For example, countries such as Turkey, Indonesia, Russia and Mexico would normally have weights in the high single-digits, but our ETF will only have a 3 per cent maximum exposure to such countries' debt issuance,” said Andrew Walsh, head of UBS ETF sales for UK and Ireland.

“Conversely, smaller EM sovereign issuers such as Chile, Uruguay and Sri Lanka will have higher relative weights than they would have in an uncapped index.”

Earlier this month, UBS Asset Management listed eight alternative beta – or "smart beta" – exchange-traded funds on the London Stock Exchange, and in January, the firm listed 52 exchange-traded funds on the Amsterdam Euronext Stock Exchange.

UBS recently reported fourth-quarter net profit attributable to shareholders of SFr949 million ($934 million), down from SFr2.068 billion in the prior quarter. Its wealth management business delivered a pre-tax operating profit of SFr2.689 billion in 2015, from SFr2.326 a year earlier.