Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Most regional portfolios outperformed in H123

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) posted an 8.1% net asset value (NAV) per share total return (TR) in H123 (period ending 30 April 2023). Most of its regional sub-portfolios (sleeves) outperformed their benchmarks, highlighting the respective managers’ strong stock-selection capabilities. Dividend income across the portfolio was up 10% in H123 and BNKR declared a second interim dividend of 0.62p (with the ytd payout up c 10% y-o-y). Moreover, Alex Crooke (BNKR’s lead manager) now expects FY23

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Well positioned for the current environment

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) has been managed by Alex Crooke, co-head of equities at Janus Henderson Investors (JHI), since July 2003. It can be considered as a ‘one-stop shop’ for global equity exposure as the fund is made up of six geographic portfolios (sleeves), which harness the talent of JHI’s regional specialists. Crooke (in conjunction with the board) sets BNKR’s asset allocation and manages its gearing. He believes that inflation will remain elevated, and that future shareholder

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Maintaining a defensive tilt

In our update on The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) in August, we updated readers on fund manager Alex Crooke’s macroeconomic views and positioning. As one would expect, there have not been wholesale changes since then in his views and the resultant positioning, as invariably BNKR’s style is incremental change. There are some developments on the potential direction of travel for geographic weightings, with the manager taking advantage of the recent relative strength in UK large caps to raise le

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Navigating through choppy waters ahead

Soaring inflation, rising interest rates, slowing economic growth and the ongoing war in Ukraine have led to equity market weakness and volatility in 2022. Despite these headwinds, The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) has done a decent job relative to other global equity managers in navigating these choppy waters. A key strength of its strategy is regional diversification, providing differing and less correlated drivers of returns than some global equity strategies. For example, Asia has always b

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Another solid year of growth in capital and income

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) has continued to post good returns for investors during the financial year ended October 2021, which also saw the 55th consecutive year of dividend increase. Long tenured lead manager Alex Crooke oversees a team of in-house regional managers, allocating capital on the basis of where he sees attractive fundamentals. Over the past 12 months the allocation to European and Pacific ex-Japan equities has been increased on the basis of attractive valuations and the p

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Steady as she goes

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) is overseen by experienced manager Alex Crooke, who has managed this fund since July 2003. As co-head of global equities at Janus Henderson Investors (JHI) he is ideally placed to make use of the large internal resource to drive top-down asset allocation considerations populated via a selection of six internally managed geographic sleeves. In this note we will update investors on Crooke’s macro views and how this is influencing current portfolio construction.

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Core option with solid long-term track record

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) has continued to post solid returns (NAV TR +17.4% in the six months to 30 April 2021) from its diversified global equity portfolio. Lead manager Alex Crooke oversees a team of regional fund managers, as well as setting the trust’s overall asset allocation and managing its gearing. While gearing has been low in recent times (averaging 1.25% net over the past 12 months), two newly announced loan note issues totalling c £75m will boost the available borrowing to

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Quality-focused global growth and income fund

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) has continued to deliver on its twin objectives of long-term capital and income growth, rebounding strongly from the global market declines of Q120 and declaring increased dividends for H120 despite the difficult backdrop for corporate earnings. Coming into 2020, manager Alex Crooke had positioned the trust relatively cautiously with a net cash position of c 3%, which he put to work during the sell-off, boosting the portfolio’s long-term total return potential

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Global outperformer on track for 53rd divi increase

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) has recently moved from a slightly geared to a small net cash position, as manager Alex Crooke seeks to lock in gains and await a more favourable re-entry point. The global fund is run as a collection of regional portfolios, with an overall tilt towards a value style of investment, although this varies from one sub-portfolio manager to another. Over 12 months to end-September almost all the regional portfolios have outperformed local indices, with the exceptio

The Bankers Investment Trust - Overview

Bankers offers investors capital and income growth from a fund of funds approach to global equities. With £1.22bn net assets, the trust is one of the largest and more liquid in the AIC Global sector. Alex Crooke has been at the helm of the portfolio since 2003, setting geographical allocations for the portfolio, with each of the regional sub-portfolios run by a specialist at Janus Henderson. Each of the major sub-portfolios will typically hold between 25-30 stocks, principally looking for cash

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Global ‘best ideas’ fund with distinguished record

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) has re-established its trend of long-term outperformance of its benchmark, after a slightly disappointing H218. While the portfolio retains a cyclical tilt, manager Alex Crooke at Janus Henderson Investors has overseen a gradual shift toward more defensive market areas in recent months. The trust’s regional sub-portfolio managers focus on finding well-managed, cash-generative companies whose growing dividends can support BNKR’s own impressive 52-year record of

Bankers Investment Trust (The) - Outperforming benchmarks old and new

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) is celebrating its 130th anniversary with a 51st consecutive year of annual dividend growth, and a new FTSE World index benchmark that better reflects its investment approach. Recent performance has been strong, buoyed by good returns from the US portfolio and eye-catching outperformance in China, while dividends grew ahead of forecasts in FY17. Manager Alex Crooke cautions that recent sterling strength could be a headwind for overseas dividend income in the c

- Stock selection drives positive performance

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) invests globally, with the aim of generating higher long-term total returns for its largely UK investor base than it could have achieved in its home market. Share price and NAV returns are ahead of the benchmark FTSE All-Share Index over both the short and longer term, with annualised NAV total returns of more than 15% pa over five years. BNKR also aims to grow its dividend ahead of inflation, and has the second-longest record of unbroken dividend growth of an

50 years of growing dividends

The Bankers Investment Trust (BNKR) aims to reward investors who take the additional risk of investing overseas with total returns in excess of those they could have achieved at home (as measured by the FTSE All-Share Index). The trust has a diversified approach, with lead manager Alex Crooke setting the geographical allocation, and regional sub-portfolios managed by specialists at Henderson Global Investors. Value and income are key tenets of the investment process, and the trust has recently a

LIBERUM: Plus500: Strategic progress pays dividends

Tatton Asset Management (TAM LN) - Record net inflows

Tatton, the leading on-platform discretionary fund manager (DFM) and IFA support services Group has released a trading update ahead of its results to 31 March 2024, due on 18 June 2024.

Hardman & Co Insight: 2023 was an annus horribilis for Quoted UK Infrastructure and Renewable Energy

The focus of Hardman & Co Research is on the nine quoted Infrastructure Investment Companies (IICs) and on the 22 Renewable Energy Infrastructure Funds (REIFs): the stocks analysed are all members of the Association of Investment Companies (AIC). We are updating our publication of January 2023, assessing both the lacklustre share price performances during 2023 and the key issues, including interest rates, inflation and power prices. As a 31-strong group, its combined market capitalisation is no

Ondo InsurTech FY24 Trading Update

Ondo InsurTech has released a brief post-YE update revealing its good progress continued through 2H24 and consequently FY24 will be in line with market expectations.

BlackRock World Mining

BRWM’s managers: we see all the classic signs of high commodity prices...

NextEnergy Solar Fund - Attractive Refinancing

The refinancing of a £135m revolving credit facility and the extension of a similar £70m facility gives NESF firepower as development opportunities for new solar are especially attractive thanks to lower module prices in Europe. They give the fund key financial flexibility at a critical time as it pursues its capital recycling programme.

Resilient FY24, confident long-term outlook

Vp’s full year update highlights sector-leading results, once again benefiting from the diversity of its end markets and the quality of its specialist businesses. With results expected to be broadly in line with expectations, we trim our FY24 PBT forecast by c.5% to £39.0m, a shade below the FY23 outturn (£40.2m). We consider this an impressively resilient performance set against a mixed market backdrop. Under new leadership, a strategic refresh is underway and management is confident in long

Jupiter Green

JGC’s fundamental story continues to show resilience, but the discount remains wide…

Lowland Investment Company - Is the tide turning?

Lowland Investment Company’s (LWI’s) unconstrained, multi-cap investment policy differentiates it from most peers in the AIC UK Equity Income sector. It offers investors broad market exposure, outside of the large, traditional ‘income stocks’ at a 13% discount to NAV. The underperformance of small- and mid-cap companies versus larger peers has slowed and a turnaround would be very positive for LWI. Portfolio returns are already benefiting from acquisition activity, spurred by low valuations, and

The Hardman & Co Monthly: April 2024

Feature article: Steady as she goes, but could be better: A review of investment company liquidity since 2016 Liquidity is the lifeblood of equity markets. The measurement of liquid asset availability to a market or company is a way of gauging a market’s health. This article builds on our previous work, which analysed the liquidity data for non-financial trading companies, by applying the same analytical techniques to the investment companies (IC) space. We analyse liquidity for ICs as a whol

AUM up 30% in FY24, record flows, forecasts raised

AUM jumped £3.8bn or +30% in FY24, reaching £16.6bn on 31 Mar 24, 12% above our previous forecast of £14.7bn. Including 50%-owned 8AM Global, Assets Under Influence hit £17.6bn. Investment performance provided a tailwind, adding £1.5bn to AUM. But our key takeaway from Tatton’s hugely impressive last few years, is that it has designed and implemented a superior offering in platform-MPS with net flows consistently far higher than peers. That leadership looks even more pronounced in H2-24 with net

abrdn Private Equity Opportunities – On the way to greener pastures?

Despite navigating through what its managers considered to be challenging conditions in 2023, abrdn Private Equity Opportunities (APEO) was able to report both positive NAV growth and double-digit share price returns in its recently published annual results. APEO’s discount has narrowed by more than 10% in recent months, so that it is trading on a 28.9% discount currently, narrowing from about 45% last October. These figures were generated over a period that saw a slowdown in activity in Europea

Tetragon Financial Group - FY23 growth driven by idiosyncratic factors

Tetragon Financial Group (Tetragon) posted a 6.4% net asset value (NAV) per share total return (TR) in US dollar terms in FY23. Tetragon’s returns normally have a low correlation with broader markets, and therefore its FY23 performance was below the 26.3% return of the S&P 500 Index, which rallied on the artificial intelligence (AI) theme. Tetragon’s FY23 return on equity (RoE) of 5.5% was below its target of 10–15% pa. That said, its performance since listing was within the target range at 11.3

NextEnergy Solar Fund – High- and growing-income opportunity?

NextEnergy Solar Fund (NESF) is almost 10 years old. Since launch, it has built a £1.2bn, 933MW portfolio of 100 operating solar assets, powering the equivalent of over 330,000 homes, declared dividends totalling £333m, and avoided the emission of about 2.2 Mt CO2e. NESF is on track to pay 8.35p in dividends, with forecast dividend cover of about 1.3x. Share price weakness that has afflicted the whole sector means that dividend translates to a yield of 11.1%, one of the highest in its sector, a

Hybridan Small Cap Feast - 16/04/2024

16th April 2024 * A corporate client of Hybridan LLP ** Arranged by type of listing and date of announcement *** Alphabetically arranged **** Potential means Intention to Float (ITF) has been announced Dish of the day Admissions: Delistings: What’s baking in the oven? ** Potential**** Initial Public Offerings: Reverse Takeovers: Electric Guitar (ELEG.L) Concurrent with its Admission to trading on AIM, Electric Guitar is proposing to acquire the entire issued share capital of 3radical Limited for