Sorin Dojan, Investment Week, 3 July 2025:
The board of Murray Income trust has initiated a strategic review to assess the options available to bolster performance and returns for shareholders.
In a stock exchange notice today (3 July), the board said it will continue to provide an attractive yield as the portfolio remains mostly focused on UK equities.
But the strategy’s performance has lagged behind its FTSE All-Share benchmark in the last three years by a significant margin, returning 10.5% compared to the latter’s 26.8%, according to the trust’s latest factsheet.
The board said Murray Income’s performance has for some time been below its expectations “and has contributed to its persistent discount to [net asset value]”.
The vehicle was trading at a 10.3% discount to NAV at the time of reporting, according to data from the Association of Investment Companies.
James Carthew, head of investment company research at QuotedData, said last year’s annual report included no criticism about the trust’s performance, while in its last interim report, the board acknowledged “that the trust’s focus on quality was not in favour and that there had been some ‘mistakes’ in stock selection”.
However, Carthew noted there was “no indication of a sense of frustration with the manager – hence my surprise at the announcement of the review”.
As far the discount was concerned, he argued the 10.3% discount was “too wide for a UK equity trust”, which mostly has a large-cap portfolio “and the sort of level that is bound to attract attention from discount-driven investors”.
“Murray Income has had a poor run of performance, ranking last in its 18-strong peer group over 12 months (over 20 percentage points behind the sector-leader, Temple Bar), and fourth quartile over three and five years,” Carthew added.
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