Our investment and business operation remains open, and we as a team remain committed to supporting you through this uncertain time.
In light of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and, in consultation with the board and senior staff, we have decided to enact our Business Continuity Plan.
With the spread of COVID-19 and recent government actions to contain the spread in Australia, the health and welfare of our staff, our business partners, our investors and the communities in which we operate and live, remain our highest priority.
Over the past few weeks, we as a team have been assessing this evolving pandemic and have been preparing for an escalation of the current situation, including testing our various business critical processes, and our ability to work remotely. We have identified team members who are responsible for these processes and we have back-up plans available should an employee become incapable of fulfilling their role for a period of time.
We will be implementing our Business Continuity Plan in a series of steps reflecting the respective government health advisories in each market, and the different physical conditions and mix of employees within each office:
- At this stage, our Melbourne head office will remain open with a skeleton staff. We will continue to actively monitor the situation and update our position as appropriate.
- You will be aware that Federal authorities in Australia have implemented a series of measures to address the effects of community spread and are encouraging a work from home model if possible. Our assessment is that a work from home model is a realistic scenario and we already have the majority of our staff working from home and successfully fulfilling their roles.
- To enable us to continue processing your instruction we would like to receive your ALL signed/scanned copy of instructions to admin@primevalue.com.au.If you do not have email access, instructions received other than by email will be processed, however in the circumstances that Prime Value makes the decision to ask all staff to work from home or there is a ‘lock down’, any such instruction received will be processed upon our return to normal operations.
- Our highly qualified and experienced Portfolio and Investment Managers are monitoring the situation in regards to their respective funds and are managing the portfolio risks. Our highly experienced and trusted Relationship Managers and Client Services team continue to be available to look after your investment needs.
Click on the investor updates below to hear from our Portfolio Managers:
Income Investor Update
Equity Investor Update
Agriculture Investor Update
Looking Ahead
We are already looking ahead – how we recover from this event will depend on the size of the funding and support packages brought in by the various Federal and State governments in Australia, and how quickly these support programmes are enacted. The good news is that Australia is in a strong financial position and well positioned to recover quickly.
Coronavirus cases in China are dwindling with China appearing to recover and returning to work and production. China is Australia’s largest trading partner. We see that Australia was insulated from the worst of the GFC due to our trading relationship with China, and we see a similar scenario playing out in 2020.
The funds are well positioned, our biggest challenge is to make sure we capture the coming rebound. Each of the portfolio managers have thoughts on how to capture this rebound in the context of the funds they manage. The rebound is likely to be aggressive, but none of us can predict when it will occur or over what timeframe.
Although this crisis is having a profound impact across the globe and the short to medium term financial outlook is uncertain, as fellow investors in Prime Value Asset Management, we remain confident that we will not only get through this situation but emerge from it stronger.
We take comfort that the majority of our highly qualified and experienced investment team have navigated through the Latin American Debt Crisis of the 1980s, 1987 Wall Street Crash, 1990 oil price shock, 1997 Asian Currency crisis, 2001 Tech Crash and the 2008 Global Financial Crisis.
We have had many crises over the last few decades. Every crisis is different, and looked very grim at the time, but history shows again and again how investment markets recover, how they are inherently strengthened by the crisis, and perform even better than before once the crisis dissipates.
We believe the same will be true for the current pandemic situation. Markets are behaving dysfunctionally at the moment due to investor behaviour, but there is nothing to suggest the markets are systematically or structurally broken.
Our investment solutions across income securities, listed equities and unlisted assets (properties and alternative assets) not only provide some diversification, but also allow us to take advantage of opportunities which will build further wealth for you our valued clients.
If you have any questions regarding the above, please feel free to contact us directly via info@primevalue.com.au.
Kind regards,
Yak Yong Quek John Sikkema
CEO Chairman