As Martin Gilbert, the chief executive of Aberdeen Asset Management, says, his investors are being well paid to be patient. The last year may have been an awful one for emerging markets, but total dividends were raised by 8.3 per cent to 19.5p.
Factor in the 15½p fall in the Aberdeen share price to 319½p and this suggests a historic dividend yield of more than 6 per cent. Aberdeen can afford it; the fund manager ended the year with net cash of almost £570 million, £350 million ahead of regulatory requirements. It spent another £50 million buying back its shares as the price continued to fall through the summer.
It was a truly awful year for equities, where Aberdeen is 75 per cent invested