US stockbrokers, Charles Schwab, has established a fund management company at Dublin's International Financial Services Centre (IFSC). Charles Schwab Worldwide Funds plc will sell mutual funds to international clients from Dublin, mainly focusing on the UK, Hong Kong and Grand Caymen. Its first fund, the Schwab US dollar Liquid Assets Fund, has been introduced attracting some $137 million (£100 million) from investors. By year end, Charles Schwab expects the assets held in this fund will increase to $300 million. The fund is designed as a short-term, cash equivalent investment.

This is Charles Schwab's first mutual funds operation to be set up outside the US and it hopes to add a number of new funds to its Dublin portfolio over the coming months.

Schwab executive vice president, Mr Steve Scheid, said the move to Dublin is part of the firm's plans to bring mutual funds to a wider audience. Eventually it aims to sell mutual funds from the IFSC into Japan and the wider Asian market.

The firm will not employ people directly to work in Dublin but will use the services of other IFSC companies to distribute and deal with the administration involved. The funds themselves will be developed at its headquarters in San Francisco.

Former IDA Ireland managing director, Mr Kieran McGowan, has joined the board of the fund management company as well as Mr Peter Sandys, former managing director of ABN AMRO Corporate Finance Ireland. The other directors are Mr Luis Valencia, president of Schwab International, Mr William Klipp, president and chief executive officer of Charles Schwab Investment Management.

Charles Schwab is one of the world's largest financial services groups and is the biggest on-line stock trader in the UK. The firm has no immediate plans to expand that service to the Republic.