JPMorgan US Smaller Companies

JUSC offers all-weather exposure to a dynamic market…

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies (JUSC) follows an investment philosophy that aims to identify high-quality investment opportunities within the US small-cap market. The trust is managed by the highly experienced team of Don San Jose, Dan Percella and Jonathan Brachle. The importance of quality is ingrained in the team’s investment process, be that through the quality of management and the business model.

It’s the end of the world as we know it

We examine five potential themes for investors seeking long-term returns in a troubled and uncertain world

Bargain hunt

We survey the discount opportunities in the market and update on the performance of our Discounted Opportunities Portfolio

How Do You Like Them Apples

Very few investors need to be reminded that the US market has hugely outperformed the rest of the world in the historic bull market following the Great Financial Crisis. Unfortunately, the discretionary fund managers that manage the portfolios of British retail investors need reminding even less, having been as a group systematically underweight in the US in their equity allocations. In the below chart, we have plotted the average US weighting in the equity portion of UK multi-asset funds in the

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies - Overview

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies (JUSC) offers investors a portfolio of small-cap US equities, with a process that places great weight on the quality of a company and the strength of its management team. JUSC benefits from the expertise of its strong team of four dedicated investment professionals, with its lead manager, Don San Jose, having 24 years of experience. The team’s focus on quality means that they will typically forgo zero-earning stocks, binary growth stocks or so-called ‘meme’ stocks.

Bargains galore

We last updated our discounted opportunities portfolio in July. Since then markets have been grinding higher but discounts have not moved – and perhaps slightly widened. We think readers will largely agree that it is hard to have conviction about the direction of markets and leadership at the moment, which may explain the static picture regarding discounts. At a directional level, the easy gains in the recovery have been made, and government support schemes have still to be wound down, creating

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies - Overview

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies Investment Trust (JUSC) offers investors a portfolio of US small-cap equities chosen via a bottom-up, quality-centric investment process. JUSC is run by a dedicated four-strong team, led by the experienced Don San Jose. The team look for what they consider to be the highest-quality companies, with quality being determined by a company’s business model and management quality above all other factors. While turnover is generally low, the team have taken advantage of th

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies - Overview

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies Investment Trust (JUSC) aims to provide investors with capital growth through a portfolio of US smaller companies. Don San Jose is the lead manager of the trust, supported by co-managers Dan Percella and Jon Brachle. Together they employ an active stock picking approach, looking for high-quality businesses that can perform strongly regardless of market conditions. Despite the focus on quality the managers will not overpay for growth, and a great deal of emphasis is

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies - Overview

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies Investment Trust (JUSC) aims to provide investors with capital growth through a portfolio of US smaller companies. JUSC is actively managed, with Don San Jose as the lead manager, supported by portfolio managers Dan Percella and Jon Brachle. The team take a purely bottom-up approach to investing, searching for high-quality businesses with strong management teams. They will not, however, overlook the price they are paying, and a great deal of emphasis is placed on f

Quality street: can the dominant style continue to outperform?

Quality as an investing style has outperformed significantly in recent years, and over the past 12 months especially so. After this kind of outperformance, it is natural to ask whether a trend is over-done and profits should be taken – and that is what we have done. When analysing the typical quality benchmarks, it quickly becomes apparent that these indices have significant industry and sector exposures, which could affect how they perform in the future and put them at risk of a down period. Bu

USA! USA. USA?

2018 saw the first negative calendar year for the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones since 2008 and, despite a subsequent rally, sentiment remains divided between those who believe the US market has more room to run, and those who think the longest bull market in history will soon come screeching to a halt. Instinctively, it feels like a correction must be due and, indeed, a recent survey of Kepler Trust Intelligence readers showed the majority feel that there are choppy waters ahead. Among those who fel

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies Investment Trust - Overview

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies Investment Trust (JUSC) aims to provide investors with capital growth through a portfolio of US smaller companies. Don San Jose is the lead manager of the trust, supported by portfolio managers Dan Percella and John Brachle. Together, the team use bottom-up investment analysis to identify high quality companies that demonstrate balance sheet strength and solid cashflows. Through constantly assessing the underlying company’s ‘pathway’ for earnings into the future, a

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies Investment Trust - Overview

JPMorgan US Smaller Companies Investment Trust (JUSC) has for the past five years delivered benchmark-beating performance through a consistent stock picking approach to US smaller companies. The managers have a clear preference for highquality companies, with strong management teams and a sustainable competitive advantage. They place a strong emphasis on the price they pay for companies and because their philosophy rests on remaining invested with established companies generating consistent earn

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Octopus Renewables Infrastructure

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Lifesafe (LIFS) - Strong growth but downgrades nonetheless as we await industrial fluid

LIFS' announcement this morning discloses strong revenue growth, with sales in the first eleven months up 62%, highlighting the attractiveness of their innovative fire products. These have made them leaders on Amazon both in the UK and in the substantial US market, where they were successfully launched early last year. However, disappointing sales from one partner, combined with enhanced competition, have caused a pull-back in sales forecasts combined with increased losses in the current year; a

A tough year, but clear fundamental value

AUM closed FY23 (30 Sep 23) on £37.4bn, 5% up y-o-y. Net flows were slightly negative (-£92m or -0.3% of opening AUM), with investment performance adding £1.8bn. It’s been a tough year for asset managers, but in a London-listed peer group, Impax recorded the second-strongest net flow rate (median -7%, see note). Some experienced heavy (double-digit) net outflows. A profit fall was due to adjusted operating costs increasing faster than revenue, by 11% from £108.0m to £120.3m. Part of this increas

H1'24 results: strength of the model evident

Vanquis Banking Group+ (VANQ, House Stock at 112p) - Adding flesh to the bones

LIBERUM: DF Capital: Taking a prudent view on the refinancing of the major dealer

Delivering growth in uncertain markets

Positive interims from Vp this morning highlight another period of growth despite the mixed market backdrop. The results again illustrate the benefit of Vp’s diverse mix of specialist activities, with the quality of earnings confirmed by further growth in operating margin (now 13.9%) and ROCE (14.7%). Strategic priorities include continued progress with ESG initiatives and a greater emphasis on Digital, with more on this likely to follow later in the year. We maintain our Fair Value estimate o

Duke Royalty - In Royal Health

Duke has released its H1/24A interim results for the period ending 30th September 2023 that are in-line with expectations. Recurring cash revenues increased 17% to £12.2m, whilst total cash revenues increased 35% to £14.1m. The portfolio continues to be resilient despite macroeconomic headwinds, and c£18m of capital was deployed across new and existing investments. We iterate a 1-year price target of 45p based on a target FCF yield of 8%.

Critical Metals plc releases its Final Results

Key Points CRTM reported a loss of £2.7M for the 12 months ending 30 June 2023. Increased indirect ownership of the Molulu project from 40% to 70%, streamlining the corporate structure. Commenced copper ore production at Molulu in January 2023. In October 2023, the Company announced that it had entered into an off-take agreement with O.M Metal & Resources S.A.R.L, for a minimum of 20,000 tonnes of copper oxide ore. Raised £600,000 at a price of 25p per share and raised a further £1.3M at 25p per

Agronomics - A unique offering in a rapidly developing sector

Agronomics (ANIC) invests in cellular agriculture companies. Since mid-2022 it has placed increasing emphasis on companies using precision fermentation technology or providing contract precision fermentation services, as these appear to have greater near-term commercial potential than cultivated meat and seafood. Agronomics’ NAV has risen almost 100% since the inception of the current strategy in April 2019, and looks set to increase further as the company’s portfolio holdings receive regulatory

The Joy of Techs - Cavendish Technology quarterly sector note

£23.3bn in enterprise value has been returned to AIM technology shareholders over the past six years in the form of 51 public to private takeouts, including 10 in 2023 alone with the takeovers of Smoove* and Tribal announced in early October. With UK valuations appearing cheap and looking more attractive to potential acquirers, we take a moment to reflect on the trends of corporate and private equity bidders targeting AIM-listed technology companies going back to 2017, through the uncertainties

Around the World in Eight Ideas - Investment Trust Opportunities Beyond the UK

Although the UK now represents a paltry 3.5-4.0% of global equity indices, home bias in the domestic stock market is estimated at c 25% across institutional and retail investors. This persists across asset classes: in the Investment Association universe of open-ended funds, 28.1% of total AUM at the end of September 2023 was invested in UK sectors. This leaves a significant amount of investors' assets exposed to overseas markets that may be unfamiliar and harder to access. In such a situation, t

Hardman & Co Insight: Higher interest rates overshadow IIC/REIF prospects

Hardman & Co Research’s focus is on the nine quoted infrastructure investment companies (IICs) and on the 22 renewable energy infrastructure funds (REIFs), most of which saw their share prices fall during 2022, while the FTSE 100 rose by just 0.9%. In our Quoted UK Infrastructure and Renewable Energy – Prospects for 2023 publication, we have addressed the three key issues of recent months: higher inflation, extremely volatile power prices and rising interest rates.