THE Scottish Investment Trust has recruited an additional specialist to help it identify undervalued companies amid the fallout from the Covid-19 coronavirus crisis.
James Webb has joined the £712m investment trust after working at the Wood Mackenzie oil and gas consultancy and the Ninety One asset management business.
The trust said Mr Webb would bring strong analytical and research skills to his work as a key member of the six-strong team that manages its assets from Edinburgh.
READ MORE: Now is the time for Scotland to justify its lofty reputation on global investment stage
The investment company follows what it describes as a contrarian strategy. It says this involves seeking out unfashionable and underappreciated stocks that are ripe for improvement.
The manager of the trust, Alasdair McKinnon, said: “The world post Covid-19 will be a hunting ground for contrarian investments and James will be a valuable resource in unearthing these gems.”
In the first half results announcement it released in June, SIT said it had achieved a resilient performance amid market turmoil.
The trust’s chairman James Will said then that timely and significant portfolio changes made by the manager in anticipation of lockdowns in Western markets had helped to shield capital.
READ MORE: Scots pension giant invests in climate transition fund
Mr McKinnon noted the trust had reduced its exposure to retailers and banks. It established positions in unloved tobacco stocks, such as British American Tobacco, in the belief the cash flow and dividend paying potential for such companies was underestimated by the market
The trust achieved a net asset value per share total return of -5.8 per cent in the six months to April 30.
It was incorporated in 1887.
A graduate of the University of Aberdeen, Mr Webb relocated from London to Edinburgh to take up the job at the trust.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here