The best performing fund was Gartmore Latin American, which returned 44 per cent over three years and nearly 134 per cent over five years.
Franklin Templeton – Templeton Latin America, which has a significant weighting of assets exposed to basic materials, was not far behind.
The Global Emerging Markets sector returned 22 per cent over three years, 66 per cent over five years and 229 per cent over a decade.
Threadneedle Latin American showed the best performance over 10 years, returning 422 per cent to investors.
Performance of funds vs sector over 10-yrs
| Fund |
1-yr returns (%) |
3-yr returns (%) |
5-yr returns (%) | 10-yr returns (%) |
| Gartmore - Latin American |
16.51 |
43.61 |
133.96 |
N/A |
| Franklin Templeton - Templeton Latin America |
12.81 |
38.59 |
114.44 |
N/A |
| Scot Wid - Latin American | 14.43 |
32.54 |
114.29 |
415.57 |
| BlackRock - Latin America | 17.71 |
41.57 |
110.33 |
N/A |
| Threadneedle - Latin American | 20.75 |
36.05 |
108.05 |
422.48 |
| JPM - Latin America Equity | 18.45 |
31.89 |
103.72 |
372.18 |
| Average Latin American fund | 17.48 |
33.59 |
103.16 |
N/A |
| Invesco Perp - Latin America | 19.73 |
37.49 |
100.95 |
406.98 |
| Schroder - ISF Latin American | 14.76 |
23.64 |
87.38 |
N/A |
| Baring - Latin American | 18.46 |
22.04 |
85.03 |
350.22 |
| IMA Global Emerging Markets |
18 |
21.78 |
65.73 |
229.32 |
Source: Financial Express Analytics
A combination of basic materials, financials and consumer products featured strongly on most of the funds’ portfolios.
The funds that did well also had around 10 per cent invested in telecoms, media and technology.
Franklin Templeton - Templeton Latin American was notable for being the only fund with significant exposure to food producers.
At the other end of the scale, Baring Latin American had the least impressive performance, with 22 per cent returns over three years and 85 per cent over a five-year period.
This was still a notable outperformance of the global emerging markets sector average.
The average Latin America fund returned 103 per cent over five years, an outperformance of 37 per cent on the IMA sector average.
Performance of fund vs sector over 5-yrs
Source: Financial Express Analytics
Chris Palmer who manages Gartmore Emerging Markets Opportunities points to a number of factors that have made Latin America successful and will continue to make it an attractive prospect.
"In general, Latin American companies tend to have higher returns on capital than other emerging market regions like Russia and China," he said.
"Price drops associated with high inflation, a strong commodities cycle, the discovery of oil in Brazil and rising wages for the Latin American consumer are all positive for the investor."
Palmer also points out that Latin America has remained isolated from financial pressures in Europe and other parts of the world.
"Recent problems in Europe have led to dependency issues leaking into Eastern Europe, and Russia is dependent on European capital," he added.
"The US dollar has also been weak. While Asian currencies have suffered because of links with the dollar, Latin American currencies have done well against the dollar, leading to currency returns for investors."
IFAs remain cautious of exposing directly to specific emerging markets regions, according to Chris Wise, director at Yorkshire-based advisor Budge and Company.
"We’ve not yet come round to pure Latin funds," he said.
"We would aim to go for an emerging markets manager who can decide globally where the best calls are to be made."
"However, if your emerging markets manager doesn’t take you to a specific region then the more adventurous investor might make their own Latin American play. It’s perceived as a risky region."
Wise's expectation of risk may be misplaced, however; the annual volatility of the IMA Global Emerging Markets Sector is 26 per cent, while the average Latin American fund is only marginally riskier with 30 per cent.