HOW HAVE YOU ADAPTED TO THE CURRENT CLIMATE ......every day to stay sane. Make sure you watch some...
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Square Mile Talking With To read more Talking Withs visit squaremileresearch.com/Insights//Talking-At-Home-With HOW HAVE YOU ADAPTED TO THE CURRENT CLIMATE? We have been working hard to make sure we are in the know. When panic first hit in early March we ramped up the number of telephone meetings with managers like Terry Smith and Hugh Yarrow. In fact we did about a month’s worth of meetings in under two weeks. With things moving so fast you really need to know what people are doing. In a funny sort of way, because no one was going anywhere, it was easier to arrange meetings at short notice. When we went into lockdown we were halfway through a roadshow. We replaced the remaining dates with webcasts which have now morphed into weekly sessions. We have about 200 people – mostly advisers - tuning in each week. WHAT IS THE FOCUS NOW? The variants of performance at the moment are fascinating. From the bottom of the market there have been some sharp moves upwards. A mid-cap fund – that I won’t name - is up 45% from the bottom but down year-to-date 25%. Yet FundSmith Equity – our largest position - has lost just 1.5% year-to-date and up 9.5% from the bottom. Anthony Bolton said the other day, as a bear market goes on you shouldn’t get more bearish, which is absolutely true. There will be many companies that can recapitalise and move ahead. However, there are going to be corporate casualties out there so we are focused on having managers that don’t own those casualties. DO YOU THINK THIS EXPERIENCE CHANGES OUR INDUSTRY FOR THE BETTER IN ANY WAY? I like to think it will help bring us back to common sense investing, by which I mean looking for companies with less leverage. But that might only be for a few years after which people forget and it all starts again. WHAT ARE YOUR TOP TIPS FOR WORKING FROM HOME? I’ve been working from home one day a week since 1997, so it wasn’t difficult to adapt to doing so all the time. However, given the sedentary nature of being in the same place all the time, I can safely say you need to get out for exercise every day to stay sane. Make sure you watch some comedy classics to keep spirits up. We’ve been enjoying Blackadder and The Irish RM. WHAT’S THE HEADLINE YOU WOULD MOST LIKE TO SEE ON THE FRONT PAGE OF THE FT? “Anti-viral drug aids coronavirus recovery”. We’d all love the miracle of a vaccine but I’m not sure that’s likely. They still don’t have one for SARS or HIV. But people with HIV live for years and years on a cocktail of drugs. I’m guessing that one of the anti-viral drugs will be repurposed. WHAT RECENT CHANGES HAVE BEEN MADE TO THE JUPITER MERLIN FUNDS? We realised in early March, like everyone else, that it was going horribly wrong, so we sold a lot of value managers - we felt that was an investment style that was really going to go pear-shaped. This included our entire position in Schroder European Alpha Income, which turned out to be fortunate for two reasons; the fund fell a lot due to significant financial and oil exposure, and because the manager resigned. We have held gold since 2008 in varying quantities, mainly as an insurance policy. As part of the shift, we added the Blackrock Gold & General. Our investment has already risen by 55% in some funds. Had we bought a day earlier that figure would have been 70%. And you might ask, how much did we buy. The answer is - not enough! Growth has been powerful because as well as gold prices rising, the collapse in oil price means it’s costing so much less to dig stuff out of the ground. Talking common sense investing and Blackadder at home with John Chatfeild-Roberts, Head of Strategy, Independent Funds at Jupiter and Richard Romer-Lee, Managing Director at Square Mile John Chatfeild-Roberts Head of Strategy, Independent Funds Jupiter May 2020 – 009
Transcript of HOW HAVE YOU ADAPTED TO THE CURRENT CLIMATE ......every day to stay sane. Make sure you watch some...
Square Mile Talking With
To read more Talking Withs visit squaremileresearch.com/Insights//Talking-At-Home-With
HOW HAVE YOU ADAPTED TO THE CURRENT CLIMATE?We have been working hard to make sure we are in the know. When panic first hit in early March we ramped up the number of telephone meetings with managers like Terry Smith and Hugh Yarrow. In fact we did about a month’s worth of meetings in under two weeks. With things moving so fast you really need to know what people are doing. In a funny sort of way, because no one was going anywhere, it was easier to arrange meetings at short notice. When we went into lockdown we were halfway through a roadshow. We replaced the remaining dates with webcasts which have now morphed into weekly sessions. We have about 200 people – mostly advisers - tuning in each week.
WHAT IS THE FOCUS NOW? The variants of performance at the moment are fascinating. From the bottom of the market there have been some sharp moves upwards. A mid-cap fund – that I won’t name - is up 45% from the bottom but down year-to-date 25%. Yet FundSmith Equity – our largest position - has lost just 1.5% year-to-date and up 9.5% from the bottom. Anthony Bolton said the other day, as a bear market goes on you shouldn’t get more bearish, which is absolutely true. There will be many companies that can recapitalise and move ahead. However, there are going to be corporate casualties out there so we are focused on having managers that don’t own those casualties.
DO YOU THINK THIS EXPERIENCE CHANGES OUR INDUSTRY FOR THE BETTER IN ANY WAY?
I like to think it will help bring us back to common sense investing, by which I mean looking for companies with less leverage. But that might only be for a few years after which people forget and it all starts again.
WHAT ARE YOUR TOP TIPS FOR WORKING FROM HOME?I’ve been working from home one day a week since 1997, so it wasn’t difficult to adapt to doing so all the time. However, given the sedentary nature of being in the same place all the time, I can safely say you need to get out for exercise every day to stay sane. Make sure you watch some comedy classics to keep spirits up. We’ve been enjoying Blackadder and The Irish RM.
WHAT’S THE HEADLINE YOU WOULD MOST LIKE TO SEE ON THE FRONT PAGE OF THE FT? “Anti-viral drug aids coronavirus recovery”. We’d all love the miracle of a vaccine but I’m not sure that’s likely. They still don’t have one for SARS or HIV. But people with HIV live for years and years on a cocktail of drugs. I’m guessing that one of the anti-viral drugs will be repurposed.
WHAT RECENT CHANGES HAVE BEEN MADE TO THE JUPITER MERLIN FUNDS?We realised in early March, like everyone else, that it was going horribly wrong, so we sold a lot of value
managers - we felt that was an investment style that was really going to go pear-shaped. This included our entire position in Schroder European Alpha Income, which turned out to be fortunate for two
reasons; the fund fell a lot due to significant financial and oil exposure, and because the manager resigned. We have held gold since 2008 in varying quantities, mainly as an insurance policy. As part of the shift, we added the Blackrock Gold & General. Our investment has already risen by 55% in some funds. Had we bought a day earlier that figure would have been 70%. And you might ask, how much did we buy. The answer is - not enough! Growth has been powerful because as well as gold prices rising, the collapse in oil price means it’s costing so much less to dig stuff out of the ground.
Talking common sense investing and Blackadder at home with John Chatfeild-Roberts, Head of Strategy, Independent Funds at Jupiter and Richard Romer-Lee, Managing Director at Square Mile
John Chatfeild-RobertsHead of Strategy, Independent Funds Jupiter
May 2020 – 009
