The Merchants Trust PLC (MRCH) Established in 1889, The Merchants Trust PLC has, throughout its history, provided shareholders with an opportunity to benefit from investment in a diversified portfolio of leading companies with strong balance sheets and the potential to pay attractive dividends. Merchants aims to provide its investors with an efficient, competitive and cost-effective way to achieve an above average level of income and income growth together with long-term capital growth through a policy of investing mainly in higher-yielding large UK companies. Speaker’s bio: Simon Gergel, Lead Portfolio Manager, The Merchants Trust, and CIO UK Equities, Allianz Global Investors Simon is Chief Investment Officer, UK Equities and head of the European Value & Income Investment Style Team. He manages The Merchants Trust plc, co-manages the Allianz UK Listed Equity Income Fund, and is deputy portfolio manager on The Brunner Investment Trust and the Allianz UK Listed Opportunities Fund. He joined AllianzGI in April 2006 from HSBC Halbis Partners, where he was Head of Institutional UK Equities, portfolio manager of the HSBC Income Funds and manager of several segregated institutional accounts. Prior to HSBC, Simon was an Executive Director at Phillips & Drew Fund Management Ltd (a subsidiary of UBS), where he spent 14 years as a portfolio manager of UK equity portfolios. Simon graduated from Cambridge University in 1987 with an MA (Hons) Cantab in Mathematics. He is an Associate of the CFA Society of the UK.
