The handover of Witan Pacific (WPC) to Baillie Gifford (BG) on 16 September 2020, following the board’s decision and favourable shareholders’ vote, marks the trust’s transition to the new asset manager. BG won the mandate with its proposal to transform the Asia Pacific growth and income trust into a pure China equity growth strategy. The manager considers that ‘still misunderstood and underinvested’ China (a c 2.5% allocation in 2019 global portfolios) is the key global growth market of the 21st century, and that global investors who miss out on the present China opportunity run the major risk of being left behind.
