Fund news & updates

22 August 2024

The UK investment trusts yielding more than 4.5% (and growing dividends)

The Bank of England has made its first cut to interest rates for more than four years, which has a direct impact on the income savers will receive on cash. And the lower-than-expected jump in UK inflation reported on 14 August only boosted market expectations that the Bank of England could deliver another rate cut next month.

As the rate...

25 July 2024

Just a third of active fund managers outperform passives

AJ Bell’s latest Manager versus Machine report paints an alarming picture for active managers, who are struggling to beat tracker funds on performance, and are losing hands down when it comes to attracting investors’ money.

The report looks at the performance of active funds across seven equity sectors and compares them to the average passive fund...

25 July 2024

Star manager down: what happens when a fund manager leaves or retires?

While the concept of ‘star managers’ may have lost some momentum in recent years, there are still plenty of funds that have key person risk.

This year alone we've seen two clear examples in the announced departures of Ben Whitmore from the Jupiter UK Special Situations fund and Mike Riddell from the Allianz Strategic Bond fund.

The commonality was...

7 June 2024

Investment Trust - June 2024 update

The AJ Bell IT Select list is designed to lighten your research load. There are many investment trusts out there – so we’ve narrowed the field by selecting a high-quality shortlist of trusts we believe can deliver their objectives over the long term. To make the list, each trust needs to pass our robust, independent selection process.

What have we...

14 March 2024

The dividend hero investment trusts yielding more than 5%

It’s not just cash savers and bond investors who are enjoying income yields above the rate of inflation, so are those buying investment trusts with exceptionally long records of increasing dividends.

Five UK Equity Income trusts are currently yielding above 5%, together providing an average yield of 5.8%. That compares to the best variable Cash ISA...

24 July 2023

Investment Trust - July 2023 update What is the AJ Bell Investment Trust Select list?

The AJ Bell Investment Trust Select list is designed to lighten your research load. There are hundreds of investment trusts out there – so we’ve narrowed the field by selecting a high-quality shortlist of trusts we believe can deliver on their objectives over the long-term. To make the list, each...

27 July 2021

Trust added to the IT Select list – Securities Trust of Scotland

The AJ Bell Investment Trust Select list is designed to lighten your research load. There are hundreds of trusts out there – so we’ve narrowed the field by selecting a high-quality shortlist of trusts we believe can deliver their objectives over the long term. To make the list, each trust needs to pass our robust, independent selection process.

Wha...

24 June 2021

Liontrust IPO puts investment trusts in the ESG spotlight

A couple of high profile investment trust launches failed to get off the ground last year, but Liontrust has a few aces up its sleeve. The vaccine roll-out has delivered a significant boost to investor confidence, and Liontrust is launching this trust in the ESG space, where we know there is a lot of demand right now. Liontrust already has a well...

9 April 2021

Best performing funds and investment trusts Q1

The first quarter of the year saw a resurgence of some areas of the market which have been badly beaten up by the pandemic, as investors look forward to life beyond covid. A number of funds even UK shopping centres posted a decent quarter of performance, though the REITs Drum and Hammerson are still significantly down on their pre-pandemic levels.

...

9 April 2021

Will 'peak pension freedoms season' return after pandemic-induced withdrawals slump in 2020

Until 2020, the beginning of a new tax year has traditionally been peak pension withdrawal season, with UK savers taking advantage of a fresh set of tax allowances to access larger amounts from their retirement pots.

In fact, before the pandemic hit withdrawals in the first three months of the financial year had been between 10% and 33% higher...

8 March 2021

Most popular AJ Bell Youinvest ISA funds, shares and investment trusts in 2021

Some fund investors have been going for growth in their AJ Bell Youinvest ISA so far this year, filling their tax shelters with a raft of offerings from Baillie Gifford, and of course, the ubiquitous Fundsmith Equity. Rival growth fund Lindsell Train Global Equity looks to have declined in popularity this year, not making the top ten in January and...

5 March 2021

Who wants to be an ISA millionaire?

Today’s ISA millionaires have shown a definite preference for investing in individual shares rather than funds, with 83% of their portfolios sitting in stocks, compared with just 14% held in pooled funds.* Those with larger amounts in their ISA may be better placed to take the higher risks associated with investing in individual equities, and have...

31 March 2020

Which investment trusts can survive the income drought?

For those relying on their income to live on, the situation looks fairly dire at the moment. Plunging stock markets, companies cutting dividends and rock-bottom interest rates all make for fairly depressing reading for investors. With companies having cut more than £4.8bn of dividends and counting, fund investors are undoubtedly going to see their...

11 September 2019

The UK investment trusts most exposed to Brexit

Investors are understandably preoccupied with what Brexit means for their portfolio, but they need to make sure they’re aware of any hidden risks in their portfolios, and in the funds they own.

A total of eight UK-focused investment trusts have gearing of 20% of more, meaning investors in these funds are exposed to more risk. Gearing works to...