RIT Capital Partners
If Eeyore was an investor, he’d be long of thistles and a big fan of RIT Capital Partners. The Rothschild family’s listed fund is a classic pessimist’s investment trust. It’s just as focused on preserving capital in difficult times as growing it in good times.
That explains its unexciting annual results yesterday. RIT missed out on most of the gains from share markets around the world last year, having positioned itself for a bumpy ride. Its quoted equity holdings were responsible for a tiny chunk of its overall net asset value total return of 12.1 per cent.
While beating its benchmark of 5.5 per cent (inflation plus three percentage points), it seriously lagged its All Country World Index yardstick, which delivered 18.9