Alliance Witan PLC Fund Data

Global shares rose modestly in September, with the MSCI All Country World Index up by 0.7% in Sterling terms but down in US dollars because the pound weakened against the dollar, giving UK investors the benefit of a positive currency translation effect that offset the market's underlying weakness. That weakness stemmed from worries about higher bond yields, and stronger oil prices fuelling inflation. Performance was uneven across sectors and countries. Large US technology and AI-related stocks generally did well, as did energy companies, while much of the rest of the market struggled—especially banks, property, utilities, materials and European shares. Overall, it was largely a rotation away from interest-rate-sensitive and "value" sectors, back towards a narrow group of highly valued mega-cap technology names, rather than a broad collapse in corporate fundamentals. In such an environment, we believe it’s important to stay diversified and remain focused on long-term returns rather than reacting to short-term market swings. Although higher bond yields and inflation create a headwind for equities, strong economic growth and corporate earnings should continue to support share prices over the medium term. Our portfolio underperformed the market, with a net asset value return of -0.3% and a share price return of 0.1%. The main reason for trailing the market was stock selection in technology and financial stocks, particularly among the largest companies. For example, relative returns suffered from not having as much exposure as the benchmark to Meta, Apple and NVIDIA, which all did well. The biggest detractor was a stock that we don’t own, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), which rose by more than 30%. The company designs high-performance computer chips that power PCs, data centres and artificial intelligence systems. AMD rallied in September because investors increasingly viewed it as one of the biggest winners from the next phase of AI adoption, with strong demand expected for both its AI chips and processors. In financials, the main detractors included our overweight positions in Mastercard and the insurance company, Ryan Specialty. Mastercard fell as rising bond yields weighed on highly valued payment stocks, while Ryan Specialty declined on concerns that a softer insurance pricing environment could temper future earnings growth. The biggest contributor to performance was Lansdowne, the private equity fund we inherited from the combination with Witan Investment Trust. Lansdowne’s performance was driven primarily by an increase in Devon-based miner, Tungsten West’s, share price following a strategic investment by the UK’s National Wealth Fund to support the development of a secure, domestic source for tungsten in the UK. The fund also completed a partial sale of its investment in Helsing, a defence AI company, at a material uplift to the holding value and a 74-fold return on invested capital. The stocks owned by our Japan and South Korean specialist, Dalton, also continued to add value. These included Macnica and Samsung Electronics. Macnica, a leading technology solutions provider focused on semiconductor’s and cybersecurity, continued to outperform during the month as the market further reflected the strength of its first-quarter results announced in August. Growth was broad-based, led by strong semiconductor demand across industrial equipment and automotive applications, while its cybersecurity business also remained resilient. Dalton believes the market is increasingly recognising the breadth of the earnings recovery across Macnica’s core businesses. Samsung Electronics, a leading global semiconductor and consumer electronics company, continued to recover following the July correction, supported by strong business fundamentals. The company announced KRW 30 trillion in dividends for the third quarter and outlined plans to return KRW 90–110 trillion of capital to shareholders in 2026, significantly above its previous high of KRW 20 trillion in 2020. Dalton says the increased capital return highlights the company’s commitment to enhancing shareholder value. The holdings of GQG in emerging markets, which included Samsung and the oil and gas company, Petrobras, in Brazil, and those of Jennison, including clean-energy technology company, Bloom Energy, and cybersecurity specialist, CrowdStrike, were other notable contributors.

Global shares rose modestly in September, with the MSCI All Country World Index up by 0.7% in Sterling terms but down in US dollars because the pound weakened against the dollar, giving UK investors the benefit of a positive currency translation effect that offset the market's underlying weakness. That weakness stemmed from worries about higher bond yields, and stronger oil prices fuelling inflation. Performance was uneven across sectors and countries. Large US technology and AI-related stocks generally did well, as did energy companies, while much of the rest of the market struggled—especially banks, property, utilities, materials and European shares. Overall, it was largely a rotation away from interest-rate-sensitive and "value" sectors, back towards a narrow group of highly valued mega-cap technology names, rather than a broad collapse in corporate fundamentals. In such an environment, we believe it’s important to stay diversified and remain focused on long-term returns rather than reacting to short-term market swings. Although higher bond yields and inflation create a headwind for equities, strong economic growth and corporate earnings should continue to support share prices over the medium term. Our portfolio underperformed the market, with a net asset value return of -0.3% and a share price return of 0.1%. The main reason for trailing the market was stock selection in technology and financial stocks, particularly among the largest companies. For example, relative returns suffered from not having as much exposure as the benchmark to Meta, Apple and NVIDIA, which all did well. The biggest detractor was a stock that we don’t own, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), which rose by more than 30%. The company designs high-performance computer chips that power PCs, data centres and artificial intelligence systems. AMD rallied in September because investors increasingly viewed it as one of the biggest winners from the next phase of AI adoption, with strong demand expected for both its AI chips and processors. In financials, the main detractors included our overweight positions in Mastercard and the insurance company, Ryan Specialty. Mastercard fell as rising bond yields weighed on highly valued payment stocks, while Ryan Specialty declined on concerns that a softer insurance pricing environment could temper future earnings growth. The biggest contributor to performance was Lansdowne, the private equity fund we inherited from the combination with Witan Investment Trust. Lansdowne’s performance was driven primarily by an increase in Devon-based miner, Tungsten West’s, share price following a strategic investment by the UK’s National Wealth Fund to support the development of a secure, domestic source for tungsten in the UK. The fund also completed a partial sale of its investment in Helsing, a defence AI company, at a material uplift to the holding value and a 74-fold return on invested capital. The stocks owned by our Japan and South Korean specialist, Dalton, also continued to add value. These included Macnica and Samsung Electronics. Macnica, a leading technology solutions provider focused on semiconductor’s and cybersecurity, continued to outperform during the month as the market further reflected the strength of its first-quarter results announced in August. Growth was broad-based, led by strong semiconductor demand across industrial equipment and automotive applications, while its cybersecurity business also remained resilient. Dalton believes the market is increasingly recognising the breadth of the earnings recovery across Macnica’s core businesses. Samsung Electronics, a leading global semiconductor and consumer electronics company, continued to recover following the July correction, supported by strong business fundamentals. The company announced KRW 30 trillion in dividends for the third quarter and outlined plans to return KRW 90–110 trillion of capital to shareholders in 2026, significantly above its previous high of KRW 20 trillion in 2020. Dalton says the increased capital return highlights the company’s commitment to enhancing shareholder value. The holdings of GQG in emerging markets, which included Samsung and the oil and gas company, Petrobras, in Brazil, and those of Jennison, including clean-energy technology company, Bloom Energy, and cybersecurity specialist, CrowdStrike, were other notable contributors.