Managed by James Anderson and Tom Slater, the global trust saw its net value increase by 17.5% for the six months to 30 September 2017, while its share price rose 15.4% as shares moved to trade slightly closer to the underlying NAV.
Over the same period, the FTSE All-World Index gained just 1% in sterling terms, with the fund’s holding in big tech companies proving instrumental in its outperformance.
In addition to the three Chinese tech giants, Anderson has long held US favourites Amazon, Facebook and Alphabet, with all six companies listed as top 10 holdings in the fund.
According to the board’s statement, the launch of first Apple iPhone, a decade ago in June, led to a mobile digital world which forever changed the operating environment for a vast array of companies. The rest of which has been the proliferation of such smart mobile devices.
“Over the past decade, the managers have relentlessly focused on investing in those companies which have embraced these changes,” said the statement. “The managers continue to believe the competitive positions of these digital network businesses will be further cemented by the power of their massive data sets and new advances in computing.”
Other positive contributors to performance came from the fund’s holding in private companies such as the digital music service Spotify and the travel business Airbnb.
“These are truly global businesses, significantly impacting their large publicly-listed competitors, but as yet they remain private companies,” said the statement.
“This makes it hard for most innovators (professional or individual) to benefit from the capital creation of their growth.”
