John Lee
Having achieved a 19 per cent total return in the year to end-August, the continued strength of markets has propelled my portfolio up 32 per cent this year. Virtually all my holdings have moved up, with particular mention going to Fenner, Gooch & Housego, PZ Cussons, and Town Centre Securities.
But many investors, including me, have felt that some shares have over-recovered and so we have seen profit-taking. I felt that building supplier Marshalls had got ahead of itself and I sold at 132p having bought at 66p last November. I also sold three quarters of the Town Centre shares that I purchased in February at 60p, for 182p – an extraordinary trebling in seven months.
Pleasingly, recent purchases have moved nicely ahead: my two large cap ‘income bankers’ BP and Vodafone are up by 15 per cent. My two new Aim purchases, Concurrent Technologies and Pressure Technologies, are also doing well. With such an improvement in investment performance, I took a risk by doubling my Cadbury holding. Hopefully Kraft should deliver its first real bid within the week.
Kevin Goldstein-Jackson
On September 30, my self-invested personal pension scheme (Sipp) portfolio showed an increase in value of 25.98 per cent since January 1 – and by October 23 it was up 32 per cent since the start of the year. The star performer was engineering company Weir Group – up from 310p to 677.5p per share by September 30, and 737p by October 23. During the same periods, Immupharma went from 57p to 88p then 108.5p; Lonmin 911p to £16.74 and £17.11; pharmaceuticals firm BTG 140p to 181.5p and 198p; and Premier Oil 985p to £12.10 and £12.88.
Keeping a pile of cash with miserly brokers was not wise and I should have invested in a wider range of undervalued companies with good prospects.
Peter Temple
It has been a few months of outstanding equity performance and my portfolio has shared in the general glee, up 14 per cent since the end of August. All my equity fund holdings have either matched or beaten the market.
The star performers were iShares Eurostoxx Select Dividend, which has risen by 19 per cent (plus a dividend equivalent to a further 2 per cent) over the period, and Blackrock Gold & General, which is up 18 per cent.
My gold bullion holdings are up by over 14 per cent compared with what I reckon is a 9 per cent gain in the equity market since August.
Nick Louth
Happily, my total return in the year to the end of September is 43.5 per cent. I put this down to two switches in my portfolio made between May and August. First, I sold out of almost all the cyclical shares which produced the most rapid uplift in prices. This turned out to be premature, but the defensives I purchased instead have performed well and I remain better protected against a sell-off when it occurs.
The second switch was to run down my cash reserves from 30 per cent to about 10 per cent. It had become clear that this is a once-in-a-generation rally and the main driver will continue to be investors terrified of being left behind. However, most of my cash has not gone into shares, but corporate bonds and preference shares.
