City of London Investment Trust posts NAV return of 9.6 per cent

City of London Investment Trust has reported a 'good performance' in the context of a mixed global economic environment, according to its half yearly report for the period ending December 31st.

The company reported that it had produced a net asset value total return of 9.6%, 1.1% better than the size weighted average for the UK Growth & Income investment trust sector.

The trust's performance was also 0.9 percentage points better than the FTSE All-Share Index, which produced a total return of 8.7%.

Philip Remnant, Chairman of the company, stated: "We benefited from gearing during the six months of between 8% and 10% as well as below average exposure to the oil sector, which was a poor performer."

With regard to the performance of specific stocks in the portfolio, he said: "Within the portfolio, particularly strong performances were achieved by newspaper distributor Smiths News where profits beat low expectations, IMI experiencing global demand for its industrial engineering products and the life assurers Aviva and Standard Life which benefited from improving equity markets."

City of London Investment Trust's share price was down 0.18% to 326.10p at 11:42 on Friday.

MF