Concerns around a second wave of coronavirus infections led global stock markets sharply lower on Monday morning. The FTSE 100 index plunged 2.2% in early trade, dropping back below the 6,000 mark to hit 5,969 points. In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell a whopping 3.5%, with the Hang Seng in Hong Kong dropping 2.32%. US equity futures are pointing to a 2% fall in indices there later ...

Alasdair McKinnon, fund manager of Scottish Investment Trust (SCIN), has denied that he has succumbed to ‘style drift’ after radically overhauling his portfolio, insisting the changes were in line with his contrarian stance. In last week’s Shares we suggested that the value investor had changed his process by buying expensive defensive stocks amid the market sell-off. Style drift is ...

Just as retail investors are being forced to deal with significant disruption to the markets, so too professional fund managers are having to react to the new realities created by the coronavirus outbreak. In this article Shares talks to the people at the helm of two popular investment trusts to get some insight into how they are coping with the current volatility. With its focus on ‘safety ...

The start of April means fund managers should now being issuing their latest quarterly reports. Normally that wouldn’t be anything out of the ordinary, yet these reports will contain the first insight into how many funds have coped with the global market sell-off in late February and most of March. Some funds and investment trusts have already issued commentary on their state of affairs. Others ...

The global markets sell-off has more than doubled the average discount to net asset value on investment trusts, moving from 3.8% at the end of 2019 to 9.3% at the end of February, according to the AIC. That presents an opportunity for investors with an appetite for risk to consider buying trusts that interest them at much cheaper prices. Several sector discounts have widened by a greater ...

Investment trust ‘Dividend Heroes’ are those which have increased their dividends every year for at least 20 years in a row. Published by the Association of Investment Companies (AIC), this list reveals those closed-ended funds with the most formidable dividend growth records, although it doesn’t tell you the level of growth and what it would be in real terms when adjusted for ...

The Scottish Investment Trust (SCIN) is an independently managed global trust seeking to provide shareholders with longer-term capital appreciation and above-inflation annual dividend growth. Investing in undervalued, unfashionable companies that are ripe for improvement, at 824p ‘The Scottish’ trades on an 8% discount to net asset value (NAV) with scope to narrow in given a market rotation ...

Alasdair McKinnon, the manager of The Scottish Investment Trust (SCIN), draws parallels between today’s insatiable enthusiasm for ‘disruptive’ technology companies and the dotcom bubble twenty years ago. The unashamed contrarian believes a prolonged period of excessively cheap money has ‘once again, encouraged an increasingly reckless attitude to financial risk’ and means that ...

While the Christmas trading period was definitely challenging for the UK’s retailers, the festive period didn’t deliver the Armageddon scenario many commentators and analysts had expected. But as the dust settles on the frenzied festive selling season, what do some fund managers make of the sector’s performance and how have their perceptions of key stocks altered as a result? Veteran ...

The idea of a ‘letter to shareholders’ might strike some of you as a touch old fashioned and grandiose but the commentary presented by some fund managers can actually offer very useful insights and up-to-the-minute market intelligence. As we write Warren Buffett’s annual missive to shareholders should be about to drop and Fundsmith’s Terry Smith has just popped his own in the ...

UK stocks open lower following the weaker trend in Asian and European markets with the FTSE 100 index giving up 0.5% to 6,872 and the FTSE 250 index giving up 0.2% to 18,373. On a busy day for retail updates supermarket giant Tesco (TSCO) beats estimates with a 2.2% rise in UK like-for-like sales over the key Christmas period, sending its shares up 2% to 216p to top the FTSE 100 ...

Investment trusts can often be tricky vehicles to understand because they have extra features over open-ended funds such as unit trusts and Oeics. Being listed on the stock market means investors buy shares rather than units and these shares may fall to a discount to net asset value when they are out of favour or move to a premium when they are popular. That means investors sometimes pay more ...

First half like-for-like sales fell in Marks & Spencer’s (MKS) Clothing & Home and Food divisions, yet the out of favour retailer remains ‘fixable’ and its major overhaul can succeed. So says savvy contrarian Alasdair McKinnon, the manager of The Scottish Investment Trust (SCIN), winner of the coveted Best Investment Trust gong at the 2018 Shares Awards. ‘We think ...

Investment trusts offer numerous benefits for those who take the time to understand them, but too often investors miss out on the opportunities offered by these investment gems, put off because they can seem complicated. In fact, an investment trust is incredibly similar to a fund – the major difference is it is listed on the stock market and you buy shares rather than units. The price of these ...

Ten years ago, many of the world’s banks were essentially bust. The global financial crisis was in full swing, and banks were facing their comeuppance for employing huge amounts of leverage to boost returns. This practice worked for a while but such precarious methods never end well. The crisis exposed banks’ capital buffers as dangerously thin. It effectively wiped out their equity when ...

It is fair to say that 2018 is shaping up to be a difficult year for investors. Stocks are volatile, and the market is in very unforgiving mood with even the hint of bad news prompting big falls in company share prices. Already this year funerals provider Dignity (DTY) announced a complete change to its business model which sparked an immediate halving of its share price while technology firms ...

Trading at an 8.5% discount to net asset value, The Scottish Investment Trust (SCIN) may interest investors who want an investment trust that doesn’t chase the latest hot fads or so-called ‘story stocks’. Instead, this product is more interested in finding real value in the market. Independently managed, the trust, which targets both income growth and above-market capital returns, has ...

So far this month familiar investments trusts are proving popular with retail investors. The top three buys are Scottish Investment Trust (SCIN), Scottish Mortgage (SMT) and City of London (CTY), according to data provided by AJ Bell’s YouInvest platform. Others in the top 10 include Edinburgh Investment (EDIN), Witan Investment Trust (WTAN) and Fidelity China Special Situations ...

Structural shifts in retail are accelerating as we change the way we shop. The sector’s constituents also find themselves at a crossroads at a time when consumer budgets are under pressure. Weak consumer spending remains a headwind for retailers. The volume of retail sales grew 0.1% month-on-month in January 2018 according to the Office for National Statistics, below ...

Investors are in for a treat in time for Christmas as Scottish Investment Trust (SCIN) is recommending a bigger dividend hike than anticipated. In the year to 31 October, the investment trust delivered a total return of 12.8% and net asset value per share (NAV) growth of 11%. The investment trust adopts a contrarian approach by investing in undervalued ‘unfashionable’ firm which are ...