Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management has launched the first exchange-traded fund (ETF) on the European market to provide investors with exposure to China’s domestic sovereign bond market.

The db x-trackers II Harvest CSI China Sovereign Bond UCITS ETF (DR) is a physical replication ETF that tracks the performance of an index of 35 onshore renminbi-denominated bonds issued by the Chinese government. The yield-to-maturity for the underlying index is currently 3.3% with approximately five-year duration (Source: CSI and Deutsche AWM, June 24, 2015). By comparison, the yield on five-year UK government bonds is 1.59% (Source: Bloomberg, June 24, 2015).

The ETF has been listed on the Deutsche Börse on July 14, with a London Stock Exchange listing following on July 20, 2015. It has an annual All-in Fee of 0.55%. The investment manager of the ETF is Harvest Global Investments Limited.

“China’s domestic sovereign bonds provide a high yield relative to equivalent sovereign bonds of countries with similar credit ratings, so we anticipate demand for this ETF should be high. Investors will also be interested in the historically low correlation China’s domestic sovereign debt has to international fixed income and equity markets,” said Marco Montanari, Deutsche AWM’s Head of Passive Investments, Asia-Pacific.

“We are pleased to further our collaboration with Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management. As China’s market develops and opens further to foreign investors, we will continue to be at the forefront of creating new products to provide investors with access to the world’s second-largest economy,” said Peng Wah Choy, Chief Executive Officer of Harvest Global Investments Limited.

China is currently rated AA- by Standard & Poor’s, Aa3 by Moody’s, and A+ by Fitch, the rating agencies. Chinese authorities are implementing a series of economic reforms designed to turn the country into a fully-fledged market economy, including financial liberalisation [1].

The launch of the ETF follows the January 2014 launch of the db x-trackers Harvest CSI300 Index UCITS ETF (DR), which was Europe’s first physical replication ETF tracking China’s domestic CSI300 A-shares equity index.