by Nick Britton
Nick Britton
How are you feeling? Maybe you’re buzzing with endorphins from the gym sessions you’ve taken up as your new year’s resolution, or – like me – simply buzzing with adrenalin from the stress of the morning commute.
January is a month when we are supposed to focus on our health, and that’s what we’re doing in this issue of Spotlight. As our regular columnist Ian Cowie highlights, investment companies in the biotech and healthcare sector stood up particularly well in 2018, delivering a positive return of 7.7% versus a loss of 3.4% for the average investment company. Despite a ‘queasy’ finish to 2018 with some big price swings, Ian has no intention of dropping his healthcare holdings in the sharps bin.
The sector has had an eventful start to 2019, too, as Celgene – a top holding in biotech funds including Biotech Growth and International Biotechnology – was snapped up by Bristol-Myers Squibb in a $74 billion deal. The team at Polar Capital Global Healthcare Trust, writing for Spotlight this month, believe that large healthcare companies shouldn’t be ignored in the excitement over companies dreaming up new drugs and treatments.
They write that given the size and complexity of the healthcare sector, big companies are better placed to meet the challenges of ‘nudging patients, persuading doctors, corralling politicians and influencing payers’. Not that any of this is easy – but there are likely to be some big winners among the healthcare giants.
It’s hard to go to a financial adviser conference these days without a presentation about how to talk to millennials about investing. I have to say I’m sceptical about banding people into generations – or perhaps I’m just annoyed that I missed out by barely a year on being a millennial myself, drastically diminishing my value on the conference circuit. But there’s no doubt that attitudes to technology – to take just one example – vary considerably even between your typical 30-year-old and 40-year-old. This month, investment journalist (and millennial) Jayna Rana writes about why her generation are ‘demotivated and delusional’ about saving and how investment trusts might help.
If you’re reading Spotlight, I’m guessing you’re interested in the investment company industry. The 2019 edition of The Investment Trusts Handbook is now out, and includes views on the future of the industry from a wide range of industry experts – everyone from our longest-serving fund manager, Peter Spiller of Capital Gearing, to Alex Denny, marine biology enthusiast and head of investment trusts at Fidelity. It’s available from publisher Harriman House now.
Finally, if you’re not already signed up for one of our VCT seminars, take a moment to check your diary and see if you can come along – it would be very good to see you there. Dates and times below.
Nick Britton, Head of Intermediary Communications, AIC
Please click on the links to book your place.
16 January 2019 AIC VCT Seminar (Leeds) 11:30 – 14:30. Speakers: Ian McLennan (Triple Point VCT), Robert Davis (Calculus VCT), Eliot Kaye (Puma VCTs), Nick Britton (AIC).
17 January 2019 AIC VCT Seminar (Birmingham) 09:30 – 12:30. Speakers: Ian McLennan (Triple Point VCT), Robert Davis (Calculus VCT), Andrew Wolfson (Pembroke VCT), Nick Britton (AIC).
23 January 2019 Morningstar Adviser Forum (Newmarket) 09:00 – 13:00. Speakers include Nick Britton (AIC), who will discuss using investment companies for retirement income. See full agenda here.
31 January 2019 AIC VCT Seminar (London) 09:00 – 12:00. Speakers: Alan Wallace (Octopus VCTs), Andrew Garside (Baronsmead VCTs), Rodney Appiah (Foresight VCTs), Nick Britton (AIC).