James Carthew: This Baillie Gifford laggard may need to rethink its options
Long-time underperformer Shin Nippon presented a tender offer to appease shareholders, but more drastic action may be necessary.
One of the interesting things to emerge from last year’s performance numbers was a recovery in the fortunes of a number of Baillie Gifford’s trusts.
In the global sector, for example, Scottish Mortgage (SMT) was the best performer – up by almost a quarter. Edinburgh Worldwide (EWI) claimed the top spot in the global smaller companies sector, making a nonsense of Saba’s claims that the board hasn’t fixed its track record.
In Japan, the best-performing trust in net asset value (NAV) terms was Baillie Gifford Japan (BGFD), up by 19.0%. However, in the Japanese smaller companies sector, Baillie Gifford Shin Nippon (BGS) had another disappointing year, returning just 5.1% in NAV terms, well behind its peers.
BGS is the same price that it was in 2017 and about half the level that it peaked at in 2020. According to its factsheet, over 10 years to the end of 2025, its share price returns are more than 80 percentage points behind those of its benchmark.
Unsurprisingly, pressure has been growing for a change. The appointment of a new deputy manager last April and his promotion to manager in May do not yet appear to have much of an impact. In September 2025, the chair said… read more
here
