Aberdeen upbeat despite slower inflows Aberdeen Asset Management, the UK fund manager, suffered a sharp slowdown in new business as investors held on to their cash amid worries over global growth and problems in the eurozone. The FTSE 100-listed group attracted £300m of new client cash in the three months to the end of June, which prompted a slight contraction in its assets under management to £182.7bn, Aberdeen announced on Monday. The inflows in its third quarter marked a slowdown from the £700m of net new business reported in the previous year, the fund manager added in its interim management statement. Martin Gilbert, Aberdeen's chief executive, was upbeat, saying the fund's performance was strong, given the difficult and uncertain markets. He said: "This has been another successful quarter for Aberdeen, despite global economic uncertainties and subdued conditions in the world's financial markets." He added: "We remain confident we can maintain organic growth of the group in these difficult times." Analysts were mainly positive about the results, which have shown resilience in difficult markets where some investors are refusing to increase allocations or exposure, preferring to sit on the sidelines and hold on to cash. Peter Lenardos, director of European diversified financials at RBC Capital Markets, said: "Aberdeen has done a fantastic job given the market backdrop. In my opinion, there is no disputing that Aberdeen has both a solid management team and fantastic investment performance. However, I believe these positives are reflected in the premium that Aberdeen trades at to the sector and to its closet peer, Schroders. I think Aberdeen is a good company with a fairly valued stock price. Aberdeen trades on a forward price earnings multiple of 7.2 times for 2012 compared with a sector average of 6.4 times, RBC Capital Markets says. Aberdeen shares traded steadily at 250.8p in Monday morning trade, slightly outperforming the wider market. However, the company continued to attract more money than investors redeemed in the period. Inflows were focused on its higher margin equity products while outflows came from its lower-margin products. The quarter's flows will add about £15m in annualised fee income, Aberdeen said. After a strong first three months of the year, fund managers had a tougher time in the second quarter, as renewed worries about the eurozone debt crisis and an economic slowdown lowered investor appetite for taking on more risk. Earlier this month emerging markets-focused manager Ashmore Group reported a loss of about a fifth of its equity assets in the three months to the end of June. Although the net inflows were lower than some analysts expected, the company's investment performance was significantly stronger that expected. Investment performance fell £2.3bn compared with a forecast of a drop of £7.4bn by RBC Capital Markets.