iShares Asia Property Yield UCITS ETF

What this fund is

iShares Asia Property Yield UCITS ETF is an exchange-traded fund (ETF) from iShares, traded under the ticker IASP (ISIN IE00B1FZS244). In a single purchase you get a diversified basket of holdings rather than a stake in just one business. In plain terms it is about owning listed property companies (REITs), which earn rent from buildings and usually pass much of it on to investors, spread across its target market. Its largest holdings include MITSUI FUDOSAN LTD, SUN HUNG KAI PROPERTIES LTD and SCENTRE GROUP. With about 138 holdings (the ten largest ≈ 37.5%), your money is diversified rather than concentrated in a handful of names.

Geographically it leans ~39.3% Japan, ~21.6% Australia and ~18.7% Hong Kong. Its heaviest sectors are ~98.9% Real Estate and ~1% Other. It is typically held as a diversifier — a slice that behaves differently from mainstream shares — rather than as a portfolio's main engine. Its ongoing charge (TER) is 0.59% a year — about €59 a year on a €10,000 holding, taken automatically from the fund. Income such as dividends is paid out to you as cash (a distributing share class), and over the last year it paid out roughly 2.98% (its trailing yield).

It holds the underlying investments directly (physical replication); it is domiciled in Ireland and UCITS-regulated, a European standard built to protect everyday investors and trades in USD. It launched in 2006. As with any investment, its value can go down as well as up, and past performance is not a guide to future results. (Fund data sourced from iShares.)