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T Rowe Price, Rakuten Securities 
T Rowe Price, the US-headquartered asset manager, has unveiled its first online distribution partnership in Japan.

Under the partnership, T Rowe Price US Structured Research Equity Strategy will be available to retail investors in Japan through Rakuten Securities' online distribution platform as a public ITM (investment trust fund) to be launched on 13 June. It provides Japanese investors with enhanced exposure to the S&P 500 Index with value added through active stock selection.

Since inception more than 25 years ago, the strategy has employed a bottom-up approach to pick securities; it also applies risk oversight and other guidelines to navigate different market environments.

The strategy’s actively managed portfolio typically holds 200 to 275 positions, with stock selection based purely on the fundamental insights of about 30 analysts from the firm’s US equity research team.