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Funds Broaden Domestic and International Choices for Individual Investors and Advisors
BOSTON, November 7, 2007 - Recognizing the varying needs of individual investors and financial advisors in building diversified investment portfolios, Fidelity Investments today announced the launch of three new mutual funds: a one-fund solution for investing in developed international and emerging markets, an international style-consistent growth fund and an asset allocation fund. Fidelity Total International Equity Fund is a broad-based, international equity fund with dedicated exposure to developed and emerging markets, including investments in growth and value stocks, and securities of small companies. Fidelity International Growth Fund allocates investments across different countries and regions of the world, and is managed with a consistent growth orientation. Fidelity Dynamic Strategies Fund, an asset allocation fund, has the ability to invest in a wide range of underlying investments and it is expected to make more aggressive asset allocation shifts than Fidelity's existing asset allocation funds.
The three new funds are available directly to investors, as well as through advisors at banks, insurance companies and broker-dealers via Fidelity Advisor Total International Equity, Fidelity Advisor International Growth, and Fidelity Advisor Dynamic Strategies funds (Classes A, T, B, C and Institutional).
Fidelity Total International Equity Fund & Fidelity International Growth Fund
Fidelity Total International Equity Fund seeks long-term growth of capital and invests primarily in non-U.S. securities, using the MSCI All Country World ex-U.S. Index as a guide in allocating assets across foreign developed and emerging markets, including investments in growth stocks, value stocks, and securities of companies with small capitalizations.
The fund uses a sub-portfolio structure to invest in four sub-asset classes. The weight of each sub-asset class in the fund will be approximately in line with the weight of the sub-asset class in the MSCI All Country World ex-U.S. Index -approximately 40 percent developed value; 40 percent developed growth; 15 percent emerging markets; and five percent small cap.
Fidelity International Growth Fund seeks long-term growth of capital and invests primarily in non-U.S. securities, relying on fundamental analysis to identify companies that management believes have above-average growth potential. The fund's benchmark index is the MSCI EAFE Growth Index, and the fund's investment universe includes companies that may exhibit higher-than-average price-to-earnings or price-to-book ratios compared with the broad international market or the MSCI EAFE Index.
"We have found that -- for some investors and advisors -- the challenge in building diversified investment portfolios is not only in recognizing the value of investing abroad, but also in finding a suitable investment approach," said Carolyn M. Clancy, executive vice president, Fidelity Personal and Workplace Investing. " For some investors and advisors interested in a single-fund solution, Fidelity Total International Equity Fund -- with its ongoing exposure to developed and emerging markets, including growth, value and small-cap stocks -- can offer them the benefits of international diversification through one fund. At the same time, other investors and advisors prefer to gain international exposure by combining funds with different investment mandates, and they are recognizing that style diversification may offer benefits in international investing as it does in U.S. investing. We believe that the broadly diversified, growth focus of Fidelity International Growth Fund makes it a solid core holding for an international portfolio, or an effective counter balance to an existing value-oriented international fund."
George W. Stairs and Jed Weiss co-manage Fidelity Total International Equity Fund. Stairs oversees the developed value sub-portfolio, while Weiss has responsibility for the developed growth sub-portfolio. Members of the international small-cap and emerging markets groups select securities for their respective sub-portfolios.
Weiss also manages Fidelity International Growth Fund and is supported by Fidelity Management & Research Company and Fidelity International Limited analysts in Boston, London, Tokyo and Hong Kong. Before joining the Global Emerging Markets team in 2004, Weiss spent seven years focusing on domestic equities, first as a research analyst covering a variety of sectors and later as a portfolio manager of several Fidelity domestic equity funds. Stairs, a 22-year industry veteran, joined Fidelity in 2005, and currently manages Fidelity International Value Fund.
Fidelity Dynamic Strategies Fund
Fidelity Dynamic Strategies Fund seeks to maximize total return by allocating assets among stocks, bonds, short-term and money market instruments. It may also make investments that do not fall within these asset classes such as commodities and commodities-linked investments. The fund is managed with a top-down approach, consisting of fundamental, technical and quantitative investment disciplines, and seeks to take advantage of strategic, longer-term opportunities as well as shorter-term market opportunities. Dynamic Strategies Fund primarily invests in a combination of Fidelity funds and unaffiliated exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and may also invest directly in individual securities. ETFs will be used to gain exposure to investments that a Fidelity fund does not provide or when relatively short holding periods are anticipated. The fund seeks to outperform a composite benchmark that includes the following components: Standard & Poor's 500 Index (50 percent), Lehman Brothers U.S. Aggregate Index (40 percent), and Lehman Brothers 3-Month U.S. Treasury Bill Index (10 percent).
"At Fidelity, we have been innovators over the years in the asset-allocation category of mutual funds," said Martha B. Willis, executive vice president, Fidelity Investments Institutional Services. "In 1988, we introduced target risk funds through our Asset Manager product line and, in 1996, we were one of the early pioneers in the target date, or lifecycle, category with the introduction of the Freedom Funds. Now, through Dynamic Strategies Fund, we are building upon our extensive experience and long track record in the asset allocation space with another unique offering. We believe this new fund will be appealing to investors and advisors looking to allocate a portion of a diversified portfolio to a fund that is more actively managed across asset classes."
Fidelity Dynamic Strategies Fund is co-managed by Jurrien Timmer and Andrew J. Dierdorf, both of whom are members of Fidelity Management & Research Company's Global Asset Allocation Group. A 12-year Fidelity veteran, Timmer is Director of Market Research, specializing in tactical asset allocation, which includes fundamental, technical, and quantitative disciplines. Dierdorf co-manages the Fidelity-managed 529 College Savings Plans1 and lifecycle funds offered exclusively to Canadian investors. Prior to joining Fidelity in 2004, Dierdorf worked for CIGNA in Hartford, Connecticut, where he held various actuarial and investment positions.
About Fidelity Investments Institutional Services
Fidelity Investments Institutional Services Company provides investment management services through investment professionals at financial institutions nationwide, including wirehouses, regional and independent broker/dealers, banks, trust companies and insurance companies. The company offers Fidelity Advisor Funds®, Variable Insurance Product (VIP) Portfolios, systematic investment plans, institutional money market funds and a comprehensive line of retirement products and services. Fidelity Investments Institutional Services Company's total assets under management were $293.5 billion as of September 30, 2007. For more information, advisors may visit https://advisor.fidelity.com.
About Fidelity Investments
Fidelity Investments is one of the world's largest providers of financial services, with custodied assets of $3.3 trillion, including managed assets of more than $1.5 trillion as of September 30, 2007. Fidelity offers investment management, retirement planning, brokerage, and human resources and benefits outsourcing services to more than 23 million individuals and institutions as well as through 5,500 financial intermediary firms. The firm is the largest mutual fund company in the United States, the No. 1 provider of workplace retirement savings plans, the largest mutual fund supermarket and a leading online brokerage firm. For more information about Fidelity Investments, visit www.fidelity.com.
1Fidelity manages the Fidelity Advisor 529 Plan and UNIQUE College Investing Plan for the State of New Hampshire, the U.Fund College Investing Plan for the Massachusetts Educational Financing Authority, the Delaware College Investment Plan for the State of Delaware, the Fidelity Arizona College Savings Plan for the Arizona Commission for Postsecondary Education, and the ScholarShare College Savings Plan and ScholarShare Advisor College Savings Plan for the ScholarShare Investment Board, an agency of the State of California.
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Foreign investments, especially those in emerging markets, involve greater risk and may offer greater potential returns than U.S. investments. These risks include political and economic uncertainties of foreign countries and currency fluctuations.
The Dynamic Strategies Fund is subject to asset allocation risk and the risks of the underlying funds in which it invests. Those risks include the volatility of the financial markets in the U.S. and abroad, risks associated with investing in particular countries or regions, or industries or groups of industries, and risks associated with investments in debt securities.
The S&P 500® Index is a registered service mark of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., and has been licensed for use by Fidelity Distributors Corporation and its affiliates. It is an unmanaged index of the common stock prices of 500 widely held U.S. stocks that includes the reinvestment of dividends.
Lehman Brothers 3-Month U.S. Treasury Bill Index is an unmanaged index that represents the average of Treasury Bill rates for each of the prior three months, adjusted to a bond equivalent yield basis.
The Morgan Stanley Capital International All Country World Ex-US Index (MSCI AC World Ex-US Index) is a recognized benchmark of non-U.S. stock markets. It is an unmanaged market value-weighted index composed of a sample of companies representative of the market structure of 49 countries and includes reinvestment of all dividends. The MSCI AC World Ex-US Index, when including or excluding securities, takes into account any limitations that an international investor would experience when investing directly in such securities. The index contains both developed and emerging market securities.
The Morgan Stanley Capital International Europe, Australasia, Far East Growth Index is a unmanaged market capitalization index designed to measure the performance of growth securities within developed equity markets, excluding the US & Canada.
The Lehman Brothers Aggregate Bond Index is an unmanaged market value weighted performance benchmark for investment-grade fixed-rate debt issues, including government, corporate, asset-backed, and mortgage-backed securities with maturities of at least one year.
Before investing, consider the funds' investment objectives, risks, charges and expenses. Contact Fidelity for a prospectus containing this information. Read it carefully.
Fidelity Distributors Corporation
Fidelity Investments Institutional Services Company
82 Devonshire Street, Boston, MA 02109
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