This fund, which was launched with £20 million of assets, claims to be the first onshore fund to use options to generate additional income. The fund’s manager, Oliver Russ, will target an income yield of 7 per cent in its first year and 5 to 9 per cent thereafter, depending on market conditions. Its returns will be hedged to sterling.

Russ also manages the £460 million Ignis Argonaut European Income Fund and says that the new fund would aim to provide an alternative to the unhedged version, which was one of the first overseas equity income funds available to UK investors.

Simon Brett, head of investments at Parmenion, reviews Argonaut's European Enhanced Equity Income fund.

This newly launched fund comes from the Argonaut boutique fund management house,which is 50 per cent owned by Ignis Asset Management. The concept is simple: the fund managers get on with what they do best – managing money – while Ignis supplies all of the support functions.

Argonanut was founded in May 2005 by two experienced European fund managers, Oliver Russ and Barry Norris, and it is the former that will be managing the European Enhanced Income fund.

The fund is an extension of the existing European Income fund. As well as conducting their own proprietary research on companies and then selecting a concentrated portfolio of 30 to 55 companies, Oliver Russ is aiming to boost the income of the fund by writing covered call options.

How is this achieved? On companies already held in the fund, by writing a covered call the fund will receive a premium that it can then distribute as income, hence the higher yield.  

However, such a strategy may cap the capital growth of the fund. For example, if a call option is written on company ABC and the current price is e30 euros and the strike price is e40, if the price at the time of expiry should be e45 then the fund will have to sell the holding at e40 as agreed. Hence, in a strongly rising market, capital growth may not be as high as it could be if the fund manager writes a number of calls. Call writing works best in flat and down markets.

The fund joins a growing list of international equity income funds with the potential to obtain a higher-than-average peer group yield. Oliver Russ is targeting a 7 per cent yield in the first year, which is double the current yield on their plain vanilla European Income fund.