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Pictet Funds has added unhedged sterling share classes to five of its Luxembourg Sicav sub-funds in a drive to meet UK retail demand.

The £2.4bn Water, £420.3m Emerging Local Currency Debt, £385.9m Japanese Equity Selection, £150.9m Asian Local Currency Debt and €46.8m (£37.2m) Latin American Local Currency Debt funds have joined a growing list of sterling-denominated Pictet vehicles.

Paul Gaston, head of UK sales, said following a push into the UK retail market later last year, Pictet was upping its offering of long-only sterling products, as well as its activity on UK platforms.

In terms of the Japanese Equity Selection fund, Mr Gaston said it made sense for Pictet to market its Japanese capability more widely as it had the largest market share of any foreign asset manager.

He said he saw water persisting as a long-term theme and highlighted the research capabilities of Pictet's emerging market debt teams, including portfolio managers in London and analysts in London, Paris and Asia.

The equity vehicles have posted attractive gains over the course of the last 36 months. Over three years to 18 July, the Water fund returned 30.7 per cent. The Japanese Equity Selection fund also lost only 25.4 per cent since its launch in March 2006 against a MSCI Japan benchmark loss of 29.5 per cent.

The emerging market debt funds, however, have underperformed over a year to 30 June.

Over this period, the Emerging Market Currency Debt fund lost 6.87 per cent against 4.13 per cent for its JPMorgan GBI-EM Global Diversified Comprehensive benchmark.

The Asian Local Currency Debt fund also declined 14.8 per cent against 11.7 per cent for the HSBC Asia Local Bond index.

The Latin American Local Currency Debt fund has gained just 2.67 per cent since launch in November, but its JPMorgan GBI-EM Global Latin America benchmark went up 4.68 per cent.

In November, Pictet announced it had added sterling share classes to 11 portfolios - the £1.2bn Biotech, £490m Clean Energy, €76.2m Continental European Equities, £57.2m Digital Communication, £601m Eastern Europe, £6.5m Euroland Equities, £101m Generics, $381m (£190m) Greater China, $403m Indian Equities, £120m Premium Brands and £76.4m Security funds.

Pictet announced last week it had also listed 23 of its offshore funds on Seven Investment Management's wrap platform. These include all the funds that have just acquired sterling share classes, with the exception of Japanese Equity Selection.

Mr Gaston said Pictet already lists the funds on Transact and Hargreaves Lansdown's HL Vantage Service platform and plans to list them on Cofunds in September.