Bestinvest says
This fund has been a consistently strong performer, driven by shrewd stock picking. Giles Hargreave is a pragmatic, highly experienced manager with a keen eye for value and growth opportunities across the small cap market. He benefits from a large team who provide proprietary research amongst smaller companies which are often overlooked by the broking community – they also help in covering the large number of holdings, which has expanded to accommodate a rise in assets. There remains a risk that further increases in assets may compromise the investment style.
The investment process is bottom up driven and value aware. However, the team review the macroeconomic environment monthly and at times the portfolio may have some thematic orientation, including modest style tilts. The investment universe covers around 3000 stocks from the FTSE Small Cap and FTSE Fledgling indices, the AiM market, and smaller FTSE 250 companies. Ideas are generated internally, via the broker community and through other external contacts. Hargreave is supported by a team of 8 - the size of the team enables him to monitor a large percentage of the small cap universe. The team carry out all their own research on companies, which includes analysis of financial statements and meeting with company management. Hargreave controls all final investment decisions.