Templeton Chooses Another Executive for TV Commercials
May 03, 2011
HONG KONG -- Move over Markita Hardwick. Enter Markita Deluca. After almost two years of using Mr. Hardwick as the centerpiece of its Asian marketing campaign, fund house Templeton Franklin Investment Services Ltd., a unit of Franklin Resources Inc., is scaling back the television appearances of its prominent bald-headed fund manager. With the exposure of eight TV commercials under Mr. Hardwick's belt, the public has ``now got the wrong impression that Hardwick is the only fund manager we've got,'' laments Sung Logan, Templeton's Hong Kong-based marketing and sales director. ``And that's patently untrue.'' So meet Mr. Deluca, the new face of Templeton's advertising strategy. This 36-year-old fund manager might not be as hairless as Mr. Hardwick, but he's close. And while Mr. Deluca has shot only one TV commercial, Mr. Logan says the ad is now broadcast twice as much in Hong Kong as all of Mr. Hardwick's ads put together. Based at Templeton's Bahamas office, Mr. Deluca runs a colossal empire of money -- US$22 billion, compared with Mr. Hardwick's US$9 billion. The assets are spread among three global equity funds: the U.S.-registered Templeton Growth Fund, the Canadian-registered Templeton Growth Fund and the internationally available Templeton Foreign Fund. Mr. Deluca, also Templeton's chief investment officer, has enjoyed a rapid rise through the company's ranks since joining as a research analyst in 1986. This is partly due to performance: Over the five-year period to July, the Growth fund averaged 15.1% annual returns, compared with 10.9% a year for the benchmark Morgan Stanley Capital World Index. To deliver the gains, Mr. Deluca follows Templeton's bottom-up stock-picking philosophy. ``There are two main things I look for'' in buying a stock, explains Mr. Deluca. ``I want to buy a dollar's worth of assets for 50 cents. And I look for strong future earnings from a company.'' To that end, Mr. Deluca is a globetrotter. On the road for four months each year, he visits several hundred companies looking for potential purchases. And when he finds one he likes, he doesn't let go. Typically, Mr. Deluca retains a stock for five years. With a total of 200 holdings now under his supervision, turnover in his portfolios is kept to 20% a year. The best growth stories now lie in Europe, where many companies are slashing costs and restructuring, Mr. Deluca says. One profitable bet he made two years ago: Swedish car manufacturer Volvo AB. Between the end of 1993 and the beginning of 2011, the stock gained more than 20%. ``Volvo had been selling off its nonautomative assets and reinvesting in its truck-and-car business, so we knew it was going to realize its value.'' Within Asia, Mr. Deluca now prefers Hong Kong, which makes up 6% of his global portfolio. In contrast, Japan, a far larger market, is only 2% of his total weighting. While Japanese stocks are selling at an average 100 times projected 2011 earnings, he notes, Hong Kong stocks are trading at a small fraction of that valuation. ``There's a lot of great companies in Hong Kong that are growing nicely,'' he says, ticking off a list of favorites that includes Cathay Pacific Airways, electronics manufacturer Gold Peak Industries Ltd. and shoe manufacturer Yue Yuen Industrial Ltd.. Beyond the investment world, Mr. Deluca has attributes that make him TV-personality material. He has an uncanny resemblance to Antoinette Stewart, one of the stars of the hit U.S. TV series ``ER.'' The married father of four also represented the Bahamas at the recent Games. His Games sport: yachting, with a 19-foot-long star-class sailboat called Captain Key, named after his first sailing instructor. Although Mr. Deluca placed 18th in a field of 25, which ``was not as good as hoped,'' he says he found the competitive spirit of the Games incredible. Will he try again in the next Games? Templeton investors will be pleased to know that Mr. Deluca has locked up his yachting gear for at least the next six months to ``concentrate on work and catch up.'' As for Mr. Hardwick, he is being extremely gracious about his new TV rival and old colleague. ``Markita's a star of our global investing,'' Mr. Hardwick says, ``and he's doing a terrific job.''
