News

07 Apr 2015

City Merchants cautious

City Merchants High Yield generated a 5% return in net assets and an 8.5% return to shareholders over 2014. The dividend was maintained at 10p. The shares moved from trading at a 0.1% discount to a 3.2% premium. The portfolio has a weighting in subordinated debt issued by European banks. This fell in value over […]

07 Apr 2015

Fair Oaks generates positive returns despite poor backdrop

Fair Oaks Income has announced results for the period ended 31 December 2014. The company listed in June 2014. Over the period from launch to the end of the year, the NAV return was 4.2% and the share price return 4.3%. They paid a first dividend of 4.25 cents per share and have switched since to paying […]

02 Apr 2015

Golden Prospect has poor 2014

Golden Prospect Precious Metals published its annual report for the year ended 31 December 2014 yesterday. it says much about the fund’s performance that it doesn’t get a mention in the Chairman’s statement and is a throw away last line in the manager’s report “The fund NAV ended the year at 31p, a decline of […]

02 Apr 2015

Split Structure works against Acorn in 2014

Acorn Income Fund released results for the year ended 31 December 2014 yesterday. Over 2014 the total return on gross assets was -0.4%. This compares to a -1.8% return on the Numis Smaller Companies ex Investment Companies Index, a -2.7% return on the FTSE Small Cap. ex Investment Companies Index and a 1.2% return on the […]

01 Apr 2015

JPMorgan American helped by technology weighting

JPMorgan American’s results for 2014 show the fund just beat its benchmark, the US market, as measured by the S&P 500 total return Index in sterling terms, provided a return of 20.4%. By contrast the net asset value total return was 20.8%. The share price return was 22.6%. They are paying a dividend of 3.25p for […]

01 Apr 2015

Impax Environmental still steering clear of Tesla

Impax Environmental Markets results for 2014 show that the fund underperformed its benchmark over the period – the net asset value and share price returns were both 1.7% as compared to the FTSE ET100 Index which returned 4.1%. Environmental stocks also lagged wider markets – the MSCI World Index returned 10.6%. The dividend was increased […]

01 Apr 2015

Fidelity Japanese beats peers but lags index

Fidelity Japanese Values has published results for the year ended 31 December 2014. Over the year the fund’s net asset value rose by 3.1%, underperforming the Russell Nomura Mid/Small Cap Index which rose by 5.1% but beating the TOPIX which rose by 0.7% and the fund’s peer group which delivered a 0.5% increase in NAV on […]

01 Apr 2015

John Laing Environmental buying a solar park and two wind farms

John Laing Environmental is buying a solar park and two wind farms off John Laing Group for £42.54m. They are funding the transaction from their £50m credit facility. The solar park deal relates to Branden solar park where they are buying a 64% stake. Branden Solar comprises two separate solar parks located near Bodmin in Cornwall, with […]