Schroder UK Alpha Income L

Investment Process

The fund’s investment universe is primarily FTSE 100 and FTSE 250 stocks, though some smaller companies will also be included. Matt Hudson follows a top-down approach known as business cycle investing. He believes economies and markets follow a cycle and aims to judge where we are in that cycle, then tilt the portfolio towards stocks and sectors he believe will benefit from the anticipated conditions. He classifies stocks into seven types: Commodity Cyclicals, Consumer Cyclicals, Industrial Cyclicals, Financials/Interest Rate Sensitives, Growth Defensives and Value Defensives. Stocks are also broken down into three different income buckets: Premium Real Yield - which drives the core of yield in the portfolio, Capital Return - which tends to be more cyclical companies, and Dividend Growth - which tend to be companies matching the market dividend with superior growth prospects. The weights to the different stock types and income buckets will vary according to the business cycle. The process also includes bottom-up stock selection, with the importance to bottom-up and top-down varying over time. Turning points in the cycle are a catalyst for change.