Archive

  1. Financial Times - Poor and Confused Outlook Continues for Retail Investors.

    Sir, I refer to Alice Ross's article " Market timing errors prove too costly " (FT Money, November 20). The article quoted Skandia saying that behaviour on its investment platform reflects the fact that many investors buy UK equities in response to what the FTSE has been doing - buying more when it is high and less when it is low - a recipe for poor investment performance adding further justification to the notion that most investors are their own worst enemy.

    By Terry Smith
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  2. ETF's - you were warned.

    The losses of $2bn incurred by an allegedly rogue trader on the Delta One desk at UBS have again raised the subject of the (lack of) risk controls by banks dealing in opaque instruments, the need to separate investment and retail banking and the risks inherent in ETFs.

    By Terry Smith
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  3. The Guardian

    The Guardian - News Corp: A family business

    Terry Smith gives his account on News Corp, highlighting how extraordinary share arrangements insulate Rupert Murdoch from the repercussions of the company’s underperformance.

    By The Guardian, Terry Smith
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  4. Accelerated Stock Repurchases

    This week there was a new development in the share buyback mass shareholder value destruction exercise which has gripped American companies and has some following in the UK.

    By Terry Smith
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  5. Well he would, wouldn't he?

    When Mandy Rice-Davies was giving evidence at the trial of Stephen Ward, charged with living off the immoral earnings of Keeler and Rice-Davies, in the Profumo Affair, she made a famous riposte. When the prosecuting counsel pointed out that Lord Astor denied an affair or having even met her, she replied, "Well, he would, wouldn't he?" (often misquoted as "Well he would say that, wouldn't he?"). By 1979 this phrase had entered the third edition of the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations.

    By Terry Smith
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  6. ETFs - Worse than I thought

    On 11th January I published my first annual letter to the holders of the Fundsmith Equity Fund. In it I levelled some criticisms at the investment fad for Exchange Traded Funds ("ETFs").

    By Terry Smith
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  7. Share Buybacks - Friend or Foe?

    Almost 20 years on from publishing my book, Accounting for Growth, I am exposing another loophole in the accountancy rules which is allowing companies to appear to have created value when they have not.

    By Terry Smith
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  8. Fundsmith's Terry Smith Commenting On The Year Ahead

    At an Editorial Intelligence event, in association with the Financial Times, a panel debated "the Year Ahead". The event was chaired by Lionel Barber, the FT's Editor, and Terry Smith, Founder of Fundsmith, was joined on the panel by Lord Andrew Adonis, Gillian Tett and Baroness Shriti Vadera .

    By Terry Smith
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  9. There’s Good News and Bad News

    Just 18 days after the Fundsmith Equity Fund opened, the first takeover approach for a stock in the portfolio occurred with the news that KKR is in talks to buy Del Monte Foods.

    By Terry Smith
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  10. Sir Keith Park

    On Wednesday 15th September we celebrated the 70th anniversary of Battle of Britain Day with the unveiling of the statue of Sir Keith Park in Waterloo Place, London.

    As Mrs Moneypenny pointed out in her column on 11th Sept, the campaign was launched in that column three years to the day prior to the unveiling:

    By Terry Smith
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  11. Fundsmith & Fees

    As stated before, our main focus at Fundsmith is on producing superior investment returns. However, fees produce a major drag on returns over time. I founded Fundsmith to offer a high quality portfolio of resilient global growth companies which we hold for the long term and for which we charge a reasonable fee with no hidden costs.

    By Terry Smith
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  12. Fund Management Fees - "Two and Twenty"

    I don't want to focus on fees to the exclusion of all else - our main focus at Fundsmith is on delivering superior performance. However, we would like to point out the very meaningful drag that fees and charges have on investment performance.

    By Terry Smith
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  13. The Reaction to the 2 and 20 Analysis

    There are many who disbelieve the simple arithmetic of the impact of hedge fund style 2 and 20% fees on the division of the investment proceeds between investor and fund manager. As demonstrated, if 2 and 20 were applied to Warren Buffett's investment performance, over 90% of the eventual value of the fund would accrue not to the investor, but to the manager.

    By Terry Smith
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