The team at Marlborough have recently touched base with Asset Allocator to keep us abreast of their latest portfolio rebalance.
So what’s new? Well, they have swapped around their source of equity yield, dropping Martin Currie UK Equity Income for Man GLG Income.
We can only speculate that this is a performance-related decision – the Martin Currie mandate was lagging in the bottom quartile over the past year, while its replacement was in the top quartile. The Martin Currie fund also has a chunky exposure to mid and small caps, which have been lean pickings for investors in recent years.
The Man GLG fund also has a chunkier yield at just over 5 per cent - putting it towards the top end of the sector.
Marlborough’s buy order has seen Henry Dixon’s Man GLG fund become the second-most popular income offering with nine owners, trailing just behind the near-ubiquitous Evenlode Income with 10.
Asset Allocator had a nosey into how these two large offerings source their dividends, and found significant concentration among the biggest payers in the FTSE 100.
Last time out we discovered that Marlborough has a penchant for Japanese equities, standing at 6 per cent, and this remains unchanged. This, for context, is larger than our DFMs’ average of 3.5 per cent, indicating Marlborough has one of the largest exposures to Japan in our database.
We spoke to chief investment officer of multi-asset Nathan Sweeney about his outlook for US equities, and here’s what he had to say:
“While we’re seeing US equities hit new highs, we don’t believe we’re in bubble territory,” he said.
“In our view valuations don’t look stretched when you factor in productivity growth driven by advances in artificial intelligence and automation, and we’re not seeing three other key signs of a bubble.
"In every bubble going back to the 1980s, IPO markets have been hot, mergers and acquisitions activity has featured huge landmark deals, and US equity markets have doubled in value in the space of two or three years. None of this is true today.”
