The Fund seeks to achieve its objective by investing at least 80% of its net assets in equity securities and equity-related investments of Small-Capitalization Emerging Market Issuers (as defined below), which may be denominated in any currency, including the local currency of the issuer. The Fund currently defines a Small-Capitalization issuer as any issuer included in the MSCI Emerging Market Small Cap Index at the time of purchase, as well as any issuer with a market capitalization that is in the lowest 15% of the market capitalization range of issuers included in the MSCI Emerging Markets Investible Market Index (IMI) at the time of purchase (between $98.60 million and $3.53 billion as of January 1, 2024). An Emerging Market Issuer is an issuer that is located in an Emerging Market Country, or an issuer deriving at least 50% of its revenues or profits from goods produced or sold, investments made, or services performed in one or more Emerging Market Countries or that has at least 50% of its assets in one or more Emerging Market Countries. Emerging Market Country means any country included by the International Monetary Fund in its list of Emerging and Developing Economies, any country which is considered a low-income, lower-middle-income, or upper-middle-income economy by the World Bank, and all countries represented in any widely-recognized index of emerging market securities (e.g., the relevant indices in the family of J.P. Morgan Corporate Emerging Markets Bond Index, J.P. Morgan Emerging Local Markets Index, J.P. Morgan Emerging Markets Bond Index, J.P. Morgan Government Bond Index—Emerging Markets and MSCI Emerging and Frontier Markets Index).

The Fund may invest in equity securities and equity-related investments of all types and denominated in any currency, including voting and non-voting common stock, common stock issued to special shareholder classes, preferred stock, depositary receipts, including global and American depositary receipts, warrants, securities convertible into equity securities, other equity-related investments whose returns vary on the basis of the issuer’s profitability (e.g., participation notes), as well as securities of other investment companies, including exchange-traded funds (“ETFs”) and other pooled vehicles. The Fund may invest through investment funds, pooled accounts or other investment vehicles designed to permit investments in a portfolio of equity securities listed in a particular Emerging Market Country or region, particularly in the case of countries in which such an investment vehicle is the exclusive or main vehicle for foreign portfolio investment. The Fund’s investments may include securities of companies that are in the process of being privatized by a government, securities of companies that are traded in unregulated over-the-counter markets or other types of unlisted securities markets, and unregistered securities issued in private placements. The Fund may also invest in initial public offerings. Although the Fund focuses on Small-Capitalization securities, it reserves the flexibility to invest a portion of its assets in securities of medium-or large-capitalization issuers. The Fund may utilize various derivative instruments and related strategies to gain exposure to one or more issuers or other assets. The Fund may utilize derivatives of all types and may invest in, without limitation, call and put options (including options on futures contracts); futures and forward contracts, including contracts related to currencies; and

swap agreements (including total return and interest rate swaps); other related instruments with respect to individual stocks and other securities, indices and baskets of securities, interest rates and currencies; participation notes; structured notes; exchange traded notes; and credit-linked notes as part of its principal investment strategies. The Fund may enter into foreign currency forward contracts as well as foreign currency futures and options contracts with respect to any currency in which it has existing investments or has contracted to make investments in an attempt to hedge currency exchange risk. The Fund expects to primarily use derivatives for hedging or efficient portfolio management purposes, but may also use them to increase the Fund’s investment exposure beyond that which it could achieve by investing directly in more conventional securities. The Fund may also invest directly in foreign currencies for hedging or other investment purposes.

In managing the Fund’s portfolio, the Investment Manager uses principally a bottom-up approach to identify particular securities for investment within Emerging Market Countries. The Investment Manager’s investment approach is driven by fundamental value and involves a rigorous, systemic and value-oriented security selection process. The portfolio manager analyzes the universe of available Small-Capitalization Emerging Market equity investments in an attempt to identify issuers that are undervalued relative to their long-term growth prospects. Potential candidates are systematically screened for fundamental value based on a number of factors, such as price to earnings ratio, price to future growth ratio, price to book value ratio, price to cash flow ratio, free cash flow, return on equity, debt to equity ratio, earnings growth and earnings momentum. Attractive candidates undergo a more rigorous review to assess the issuer’s long-term prospects, including with respect to management strength, market outlook, competitiveness, regulatory changes, restructuring and expansion plans, profitability, financial viability, interest coverage and hidden assets. As part of this process, the Investment Manager conducts visits to various companies in the small-capitalization segment of Emerging Market Countries and utilizes a proprietary database and earnings forecasts to compare applicable industries and issuers. The screening process is designed, in part, to avoid investments deemed by the portfolio manager to have unacceptable risk factors. The portfolio manager also reviews and takes into account overall Fund exposures to particular Emerging Market Countries and sectors in an effort to construct a portfolio that provides adequate diversification and risk controls. Taking into account the results of this screening process, the portfolio manager selects particular investments designed to produce a diversified equity portfolio of Small-Capitalization Emerging Market Issuers.

The Investment Manager may in its sole discretion consider selling a particular security held in the Fund’s portfolio when the factors that led to its investment change adversely or when a more attractive candidate is identified.

In response to adverse market, economic, political or other conditions, the Fund may deviate from its principal strategies by making temporary investments of some or all of its assets in various instruments, including short-term, high-quality fixed income securities denominated in any currency, including obligations of Emerging Market Issuers and countries, cash, cash equivalents, money market funds, and other similar funds. The Fund may not achieve its investment objective when it does so. The Fund may also invest a portion of its assets in such investments and instruments on a short term or temporary basis to manage its cash positions or otherwise manage the Fund efficiently.

The Fund observes a policy to normally invest at least 80% of its net assets (plus borrowings made for investment purposes) in equity securities and other equity-related investments of Small-Capitalization Emerging Market Issuers. The Fund’s investments in derivatives and other synthetic instruments that have economic characteristics similar to these investments will be counted toward satisfaction of the Fund’s 80% investment policy.

The Investment Manager may engage in active and frequent trading of the Fund’s portfolio securities to achieve the Fund’s investment objective. The Fund may pay transaction costs, such as the brokerage commissions, when it buys and sells securities (or “turns over” its portfolio). A higher portfolio turnover rate may indicate higher transaction costs and may result in higher taxes for you if your Fund shares are held in a taxable account. These costs, which are not reflected in Annual Fund Operating Expenses or in the Examples, may adversely affect the Fund’s investment performance.