The Australian Growth Fund gives you access to invest in quality, growing Australian businesses. The Australian market is deeper and broader than in New Zealand, which provides numerous opportunities to invest in great businesses. Being such a broad market with so many investment opportunities means some companies are often poorly researched and not well understood by the market. The outcome of this is that high quality companies can trade below their inherent value. Our team making investment decisions are well informed and spend their time conducting their own research on this market.
There is a lot of diversity in the products and services that companies in the Australian market offer. Because of the population size,the growth path for Australian companies can be smoother than in New Zealand. This is important as it provides these companies a broader growth opportunity domestically, before they need to consider the challenging step of exporting their business model to chase growth.
CSL Limited » |
|
11% Share Price Change | 0.7% Contribution to Return |
Westpac Banking Corporation |
|
-10% Share Price Change | -0.5% Contribution to Return |
oOh media Ltd |
|
13% Share Price Change | 0.5% Contribution to Return |
CSL Limited | 8.0% |
Seek Limited | 7.7% |
Carsales.Com Limited | 7.0% |
Cash | 6.3% |
The Australian Growth Fund returned 2.9% in November. Strong performers for the month included two companies reporting stellar double digit results for the month. Technology One (+25.9%) released its first set of financial results under a new accounting standard in the month which was well received by the market. The company continues to successfully sign up new customers to its product suite. It also continues to convert its on-premise customers to its cloud offering, adding to the recurring cloud based revenue stream that is coveted by the market. CSL (+10.7%) benefitted from industry data (and commentary by competitors) pointing to tightness in the balance of supply & demand in key plasma based therapy markets. This has fed into a number of earnings and valuation upgrades by brokers which supported the share price performance.
Notable drags on performance were in the banking sector. Westpac (-10.5%) fell sharply as the statement of claim by AUSTRAC filed in the Federal Court of Australia took the market by surprise. The statement of claim extended beyond anti-money laundering compliance breaches self-reported by Westpac and included funds transfers characteristic of the type linked to child exploitation activities. In the wake of the statement of claim, Westpac’s CEO resigned and the Chairman of the Board of Directors has brought forward his retirement. National Australia Bank’s (-6.8%) share price fell in sympathy. AUSTRAC is currently investigating anti-money laundering compliance breaches at National Australia Bank which were also self-reported.
In the portfolio holdings below you will find a diverse range of companies. Some of these will be brands you know well, and others may be new to you. The companies we invest in range from banks and fast food brands, to companies in the healthcare and tech sectors.
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