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#Monthly Reports
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Added 4 years ago

24-Sep-2020:  PIA: August 2020: "HEALTHY GROWTH PROSPECTS AT THE MOST ATTRACTIVE VALUATIONS"

COMMENTARY

August was another very strong month for global share markets, with the MSCI World  index returning 6.7% in US dollar terms. This was driven by large cap US technology stocks (and the FAANGs in particular).

Towards the end of the month, as the rally in the FAANGs picked up steam, it became increasingly difficult to find any fundamental justification for the repricing of the stocks in question. However, there was talk in the market of a “Nasdaq whale” taking huge positions in the tech sector and stoking the gains. It has since come to light that the “whale” in question was the Japanese technology conglomerate Softbank. Various news sources revealed that Softbank began purchasing billions of dollars’ worth of derivative exposure to the large tech names, which forced the investment banks on the other side of those trades to purchase an enormous amount of stock (in order to hedge their own exposure).

The other notable development during August was the strength of the Australian dollar, which rose more than 3% against the US dollar. As a result, the MSCI World index ended up returning 3.5% in Australian dollar terms.

The Portfolio delivered 3.4% for the month. This is a particularly pleasing result given that, for risk management purposes, the portfolio was heavily underweight the US market and the US tech sector in particular. Flow Traders, Vestas, and Alibaba were notable contributors to the Portfolio’s relative return, adding 0.45%, 0.44%, and 0.35% respectively, while Lumentum, Rakuten, and Bharti Airtel detracted 0.23%, 0.20%, and 0.16% respectively from the Portfolio’s relative return.

During the month, the Portfolio increased its position in SIG, took profits on holdings such as Pinterest and Thermo Fisher, and exited in full its remaining positions in Microsoft and Alphabet (Google). This means that the Portfolio is no longer exposed to large-cap tech stocks.

While the FAANGs have been very popular, and now make up approximately 15% of the global benchmark, it is very important that we adhere to our fundamental principles, regardless of the prevailing mood in the market (and especially when the path of least resistance would simply be to follow the herd).

Microsoft and Alphabet are both extraordinary companies. However, given the extent to which their share prices have risen, the justification to hold on to our positions had worn thin. We, therefore, used the surge in the large cap tech space (which, as outlined above, was being driven by some extraordinary forces) as an opportunity to lock in our gains, preserve client capital and minimise volatility risk.

We would like to highlight that the risk to markets (and to the US market in particular) has been mounting in recent times. Challenges include:

  • the ongoing impacts of the COVID pandemic,
  • the uncertainty surrounding the upcoming US election,
  • the continued escalation in US-China tensions,
  • as well as the unknown end game from promiscuous global monetary policy.

We continue to allocate client capital into businesses that we see as offering healthy growth prospects at the most attractive valuations. We believe that the US Tech and Financial Tech sectors are very expensive. Therefore, we strongly believe that it is important to be looking elsewhere. We have been able to identify more favourable risk/reward opportunities for our clients in other parts of the market and we are continuing to find pockets of value in different sectors around the world. The Fund remains 86% invested in companies that we believe offer comparable growth prospects, with more favourable valuations.

 

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Valuation of $1.405
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Added 3 years ago
17-Mar-2020: The 06-March-2020 NTA backing for PIA (Pengana International Equities LIC) was $1.2779, and they would be a fair bit lower now, 7 trading days later. However PIA are trading today at $0.86, so the NTA-discount is really significant. Time to jump onboard? They do have some downside protection (hedging) in place to smooth the volatility, although that would be getting more expensive these days to keep in place for much longer. They are also not as exposed to the USA as many global funds are, as they have seen more value in Europe, with a few well-chosen Chinese companies in their portfolio as well, such as internet behemoths, Alibaba and Tencent, which have dominant market positions in an economy that continues to have a very favourable long-term outlook. Considering that the household final consumption expenditure per capita in China is roughly half of places like Malaysia, Argentina and Turkey, there’s still a very long runway for growth in that market. They also pay reasonable dividends, having built up a reasonable profit reserve years back when they were called the Hunter Hall Global Value Fund and their CIO was Peter Hall (now retired from professional funds management). Since Pengana took over the management of the fund (after a bunfight with Geoff Wilson's WAM Funds), PIA has performed rather poorly, but Wilson's LICs still hold 11% of all PIA shares, surpassed only by SOL (Washington H Soul Pattinson) who hold 12.6% of PIA. If PIA's performance doesn't improve soon, I get the feeling that Geoff might have another tilt at them, or at least apply some more pressure to get them to try to return more value to shareholders. Meanwhile, PIA looks like they've got one of the largest NTA-discounts available in the LIC space to me. Most ASX-listed globally-focused LICs do trade at NTA discounts currently, but PIA's discount is larger than most of the others. Update: 16-Sep-2020: Net tangible asset value BEFORE provision for tax on unrealised income and gains (pre-tax NTA) on 11-Sep-20 was $1.30. Net tangible asset value AFTER provision for tax on unrealised income and gains (post-tax NTA, also on 11-Sep-20) was $1.28. With low-portfolio-turnover LICs like this one, we normally use the pre-tax NTA, so $1.30 it is. I do not hold this stock however. I see bigger NTA discounts elsewhere in better managed LICs. Update: 17-Mar-2021: PIA's before-tax NTA on 12-Mar-2021 was $1.4051. Still not holding this one.
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