20th Mar 2014 13:45
LONDON (Alliance News) - The North American Investment Trust PLC Thursday said its net asset value per share total return underperformed against its reference index over its last financial year.
The investment manager said the underperformance was a result of the way the portfolio was weighted, with overweight allocation to consumer staples and telecom and an underweight position in consumer discretionary.
"It is interesting to compare this result over the year with the S&P 500 index; this is not our benchmark but gives an indication of the performance of the US equity market," James Ferguson, Chairman, said in a statement.
"The S&P provided a total return of 17.2% in sterling terms, however, there was a sharp divergence between higher and lower yielding constituents of the index particularly beginning in mid-2013 when the Federal Reserve began to discuss the possible tapering of its asset purchase programme," Ferguson added.
"Relatively it was not a good year for yield stocks, but over the longer term we believe that the quality of the underlying companies in the portfolio can provide above average dividend growth as well as good performance in capital terms," Ferguson said.
The trust aims to provide investors with above average dividend income and long term capital growth through active management of a portfolio consisting predominantly of S&P 500 US equities.
The trust's shares were Thursday quoted at 791.00 pence, down 0.5%.
By Samuel Agini; [email protected]; @samuelagini
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