View all posts

Global Strategy Fund: September 2022

Summary

  • July marked a rally in equity and bond markets, with both asset classes selling off in August and more so in September. Markets were volatile on the back of the Jackson Hole summit, where the Fed and other central banks focused on inflation rather than supporting economic growth.
  •  All underlying sectors produced negative returns for September with Health Care being the best performer with a return of -4.5%. Global equities, as measured by the FTSE All-World Total Return Index, fell by -9.5% over the same period.
  • Over the past quarter, growth stocks outperformed value stocks however, on a year-to-date basis, it is value stocks that outperform growth stocks.
  • Global bonds (as measured by The FTSE World BIG Index) had another negative month returning -5.2% for September.
  • The Global Strategy fund priced for the last time in September, returning -6.4% between 31st August and the 28th of September 2022. The fund outperformed its strategic asset allocation, which returned -6.6% for the same period.
  • The star performer for September was the alternatives hedge fund of funds manager, Aurum, that returned a solid performance of +1.3% for the month.
  • Both the concentrated equity fund, Mundane World Leaders and the core equity manager, Epoch outperformed the benchmark as measured by the FTSE All World Equity Index, returning -7.9% and -9.2% for September.
  • The deep value equity manager, Lyrical underperformed the benchmark for the month returning -11.7%.
  • Global property and China came under immense pressure in September; the AB Global Real Estates Securities fund returned -13.2% and the small exposure to China via the Cederberg China fund returned -10.1%.
  • The global bonds exposure via the Colchester Global Bond Fund also had a negative return of -6.2% for the period.
  • The Global Strategy fund reflects the macroeconomic house view of Ashburton Investments, and subsequently the tactical asset allocation of the fund was changed in May 2022 (no new changes were made in September 2022). The equities exposure was reduced from 67% to 65% and the fund is now neutral to its strategic asset allocation. The Alternatives exposure was increased by 2%, to 32%.