About Altus Financial Services

Altus Financial & Consulting (Altus), head quartered in the financial hub of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), answers the investment planning needs of discerning private investors. Establishing a global presence, Altus works with clients in diverse locations including China, Cape Town, Moscow, Australia and Singapore.

As an independent consultancy Altus has agreements with large, regulated and highly respected financial institutions throughout the world. All solutions including retirement programs, children’s education fee planning, discretionary trusts, and private portfolio management are internationally portable.

In the UAE, Altus is regulated by the Abu Dhabi Government, under company trade license CN-1875005. Altus’s objective in building and protecting wealth for clients promotes lasting and trustworthy relationships worldwide, evidenced in clients’ testimonials.

Investing in the World Today

Whether an investor has accumulated capital from their employment, from an inheritance, holds existing investments or by chance they want to see their capital grow effectively. It may be invested but not achieving the level of performance or attention expected, or it may just be sitting on deposit. Most investors have three choices of action:

1. They can manage the investment themselves – for most people a difficult task to combine with their responsibilities at work and home or simply due to a lack of appropriate knowledge.
2. They can use a major institution such as a bank or a large stockbroker – whilst these institutions have varying levels of expertise they seldom are interested in the investor as an individual. The result is often some performance with little or no servicing.
3. They can use a small independent financial adviser (IFA) – whilst these companies are better with individual service they lack in-house expertise and knowledge in managing the invested capital.

In each of these three categories most people hold investment like "stamp collections" and changes to holdings rarely occur. However, markets change, individual circumstances of the client change and an individual's investments should be seen in the same way – they should be actively managed with diligence and professionalism.

Altus is the perfect balance between the major institution and the smaller IFA. Since inception it has developed its own unique, in-house client management service delivered by a dedicated team of professionals, solely focused on providing a day-to-day service to actively manage clients' portfolios.

Regular Saving

Most people have disposable income and generally leave this to build in the bank, occasionally doing something with the accumulated capital. This is not the most efficient way of utilising disposable income. Just like capital investment it is essential to have excess income working hard - leaving it in the bank, subject to interest rate fluctuations and inflation, does not achieve this goal.

Utilising excess income is imperative and it is equally imperative to utilise the ability you have to save now… it may not always be the case. Therefore it makes great sense to take a decent proportion of this excess income and direct it on a regular basis into a structured saving vehicle.

Some of the most common objectives our clients want to achieve by using a regular saving plan include:

• Personal Pension Facility
• Education Fee Planning
• Accumulate Capital

Knowledge and management of off-shore savings plans are implemented by Altus. We have extensive experience of recommending how people can supplement their pension, prepare to support children's education, build capital to buy a retirement home or to just stop spending all their hard earned disposable income.

Investment plans Altus recommends to clients have choice in: the saving amount, the length of time, the preferred payment method, to move location seamlessly and to select the range of investment funds to suit their personal profile. Altus then monitors the performance of the plan and provides an ongoing service on a regular basis.

Portfolio Management

Research has determined that the major cause of disappointment is in the divide between promises and the actual delivery of tangible and sustainable investment returns. How is it that each investment company claims superiority over others and what is it that gives them this monopoly on insight, knowledge, technique and strategy? The answer is simple: they haven’t any such monopoly, but you could be forgiven for believing it.

What does this mean?

• It is imperative to have investments professionally and actively managed
• It is vital that the client's goals and objectives are reflected in the portfolio
• It is essential to have a trusting, long term relationship with a desired level of service

Versatility

• Stocks & shares quoted on any recognised stock exchange
• Authorised unit trusts, investment trusts and other types of mutual funds
• Direct bonds
• Exchange traded funds
• Commodity index trackers
• Structured products

Altus has extensive experience in arranging the setting-up and management of portfolios. Altus ensure portfolios work hard within established client guidelines. Clients benefit from maximum asset flexibility in portfolio investment; accessing funds on highly competitive investment conditions and saving valuable time as Altus and custodian take care of administration.

Altus Asset Management

Altus team of experts consists of an analyst and a portfolio manager who constantly seek to enhance their performance and service to clients. Managing clients’ investments on a daily basis exceeds expectations and delivers results.

A personal investment manager, swift administration and dealing, on-line access, regular statements and reviews, and constant open lines of communication are all features of this service. Feedback from investors is encouraged and Altus's reaction is immediate.

The sole objective is to produce a strong performing investment management service that is second to none. Investor satisfaction is paramount with capital and savings being in the best hands.

Importance

The importance of asset management is often under estimated when markets perform well. When the markets go through a period of volatility, emotions and confidence can fall and rise with the markets themselves. Many investors lose confidence and sell when things look bleak.

Altus Asset Management's investment allocation process is designed to reach the targets set out by clients, whether markets are showing positive returns or going through a period of volatility.

Asset Allocation

For most people, life in the twenty-first century is full of choice, chance, opportunity, decision, risk and reward. In an investment context, the two most important attributes are risk and return. When considering any investment, your primary concern should be the return you expect and the level of uncertainty associated with it; that is, how likely it is that the expected return will be realised when you need it?

In a perfect world, the return on any investment would be exactly as expected and there would be no risk. Your choice would be simple: all you would have to do is to compare the returns on different classes of assets, choose the asset with the highest return and sit back and enjoy life. But that unfortunately, is not the way of the world. Uncertainty in the market means that various assets are subject to corresponding risks.

Cash is not risk-free!

Cash is often described as a "risk-free" asset but in reality it is not. Holding all your assets in this form involves two obvious risks: inflation risk, which over time erodes buying power and the exchange rate risk, which means that money can buy more (or less) abroad depending on exchange rate movements. And of course, the cash deposit itself is only as safe as the bank that houses it.

Every class of asset has a different combination of risk and return:

• Cash has the lowest risk but also the lowest return
• Bonds have a higher return but higher risk depending on issuer quality
• Property returns are typically superior to bonds but carry higher risks due to lack of liquidity
• Equities have a higher return but associated with this; higher risk

Alternative investments may have the highest potential return but also the highest potential risk.

Each individual investor has a 'risk tolerance', a different attitude towards risk and return. It is essential that characteristics of chosen investments be 'matched' to goals, to accommodate tolerance to risk. Altus Asset Management expertly tailors portfolios to match clients' risk-return profiles.