By Simon Jessop
LONDON (Reuters) - Aberdeen Asset Management (L:ADN) said market gains after Britain's surprise vote to leave the European Union had boosted its funds, more than offsetting the impact of customers withdrawing their money in favour of less risky investments.
Emerging markets, in which many of Aberdeen's funds specialise, have bounced in recent months after three years of weakness amid persistent concerns about global growth, particularly in China, and the prospect of rising U.S. interest rates.
That recovering trend, driven by prospects for central banks taking monetary measures to support growth, has helped boost Aberdeen shares in recent months and the stock was up 2 percent at 314.9 pence by 1020 London time.
Aberdeen shares were not far from their 2016 high of 325.9p set last week following a sharp recovery from a selloff sparked by Britain's EU vote.
Many investors remain nervous towards emerging markets, however, and continue to pull money from the asset class, a trend also seen in a recent update from rival Ashmore (L:ASHM) which reported a quarterly net outflow of 700 million pounds.
Aberdeen said on Monday investors had yanked 8.9 billion pounds from its stock, fixed income, property, alternative, quantitative and multi-asset funds during the June quarter.
However, that was more than offset by a 9 billion pound rise in the value of its assets from market moves and a further 8.5 billion pound gain from positive currency fluctuations.
Britain's pound
That in turn took total Aberdeen's assets under management in the quarter to 301.4 billion pounds, up 2.9 percent from the end of March.
RBC analyst Peter Lenardos said the update was mixed, with the high net outflows offset by a slowing in the pace of outflows from the firm's equity funds, which would likely lead to upgrades in analyst forecasts.
Aberdeen also said it was seeing strong institutional demand for property, adding to the picture of more steady conditions in that asset class which suffered a rush of redemption requests after the EU vote, forcing several firms to put a halt on investors withdrawing their cash.
The firm had already this month lifted the suspension of withdrawals from its 3.2 billion pound UK property fund.