An update on MoneyWeek’s model portfolio – July 2016

When we introduced the MoneyWeek investment trust portfolio I told you that I wasn't expecting that much from it. We wanted stability, defensiveness (we worry...), some exposure to growth and some income. And we wanted not to have to change its composition very often. So how is it doing? The answer to that is: just fine.

Since inception, it has returned 64% compared with 44% from the FTSE All-Share. Over the last year it has given us a total of 5.18% against 2.11% from the FTSE All-Share and in the short period since the Brexit vote 3.16% against 3.52%. Where the comparisons don't look quite as good is against the MSCIWorld index (including emerging markets): there the numbers are 79%, 14%, and 10.5%, which we can mostly put down to the strong US dollar.

The best performer over the last year has been Personal Assets Trust, a fund we have held from the start for its defensive characteristics. That's worked out well: its gold holdings have been particularly good performers over the last six months. Scottish Mortgage isn't there for its defensive characteristics, but its US exposure was good news as the pound fell last week.

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I don't need to say much about Finsbury you can read the interview with its manager above,and there is a longer piece on Train's views on our website at MoneyWeek.com. It's a good "forever" fund.

The underperformers over the past year have been Caledonia and Law Debenture. However, there seems little reason to do much about this. The former investment trust currently trades at a large discount to its net asset value (as you can see from the table opposite), but has a sensible-looking portfolio and a fabulous history of rising dividend payouts. The latter offers a diversified portfolio full of good-value firms, a low ongoing charge and an attractive yield of 3.4%. So, as per usual, we are making no changes.