Woodford Concerns

JohnRo

The bone of contention is with the journalist not the manager.

Thrugelmir

Sailtheworld wrote: »

Last 10 years Berkshire Hathaway +224% / S&P +191%.

You appear to overlooking reinvested income for the S&P 500.

For the record. 25-02-2019

Buffett told the network that his two investing gurus, Ted Weschler and Todd Combs, have each underperformed the S&P 500 during the past few years by a "tiny bit." Even so, he added that their stock picks have done better than his.

Best to keep your pistol in it's holster.

Moe_The_Bartender

bowlhead99 wrote: »

So the idea that Kent pension fund looked at him launching a new fund in 2014 and thought 'hmm, his fund went up a lot last month, let's get it' seems like you are trivialising the thought process somewhat. At the least, it would have been 'hmm, his fund went up a lot across two generations of human life and three or four economic cycles, let's get it'.

As an amateur investor who takes a close interest in my investments, I always make a point of looking under the bonnet to see what the people who are looking after my money are doing. I had a six figure sum in Invesco High Income up to 2014. When Woodford set up his own company, I left half with Invesco and put the rest into WEI.

By 2016, despite sitting on some nice gains, I became sufficiently concerned by what Woodford was doing and sold out. I looked at what Mark Barnett was doing at Invesco and sold that too because he simply seemed to be copying what his former boss was doing, albeit somewhat constrained by his own bosses. I put the lot into Lindsell Train UK which is up by over 70% since then.

It's what’s happening now that matters, not what happened in the past. Past performance is no guide etc......

If an amateur like me can spot simple things like that, why can’t the pension fund trustees for Kent do that too. They’re supposed to know a bit about these things unless they are time servers who were put where it was thought they could do no harm.

bowlhead99

Moe_The_Bartender wrote: »

By 2016, despite sitting on some nice gains, I became sufficiently concerned by what Woodford was doing and sold out.

If an amateur like me can spot simple things like that, why can’t the pension fund trustees for Kent do that too.

You decided you didn't like it; they decided they were ok with it. Investment is about opinion.

With hindsight, you made the right call to get off the ride at what turned out to be close to the top and go and jump onto a different fund manager's conviction-driven fund. Other advice firms joined you in ceasing to recommend WEIF. Kent later decided that Woodford's strategy had too much of stuff that they didn't like and was not easily-fixable due to being open ended, such that high redemptions would kill it. Unfortunately they came to this conclusion too late.

I see your point of view, but generalising, I don't pay too much heed to the clamours of [incredulous voice] 'how can someone in charge of large amounts of money make imperfect decisions sometimes, while I, a mere amateur, made the right call on this particular fund, at a fortuitous time??!'.

You're probably right that like many other areas of public sector, some people are in senior roles without having sufficient experience, independence of mind etc, and are put out to pasture in a job which they coast through, oblivious to how someone else should have done it better. Unfortunately if the pension fund had brought in someone better from the private sector it might have blown the budgets without actually guaranteeing the right results; if they outsource the fund selection advice to a separate group you will get people moaning about the layers of cost, and why don't they just stick it in an index etc.

AnotherJoe

bowlhead99 wrote: »

You decided you didn't like it; they decided they were ok with it. Investment is about opinion.

With hindsight, you made the right call to get off the ride at what turned out to be close to the top and go and jump onto a different fund manager's conviction-driven fund. Other advice firms joined you in ceasing to recommend WEIF. Kent later decided that Woodford's strategy had too much of stuff that they didn't like and was not easily-fixable due to being open ended, such that high redemptions would kill it. Unfortunately they came to this conclusion too late.

I see your point of view, but generalising, I don't pay too much heed to the clamours of [incredulous voice] 'how can someone in charge of large amounts of money make imperfect decisions sometimes, while I, a mere amateur, made the right call on this particular fund, at a fortuitous time??!'.
.

I think you give too much credit to those fund managers who didn't spot this, it's more than a difference of opinion over whether they should buy company a or b , or if they were a bit top heavy in unlisted funds

It's as if a bunch of art experts were looking at a "Van Gogh" I'd faked using acrylic paints that wee still drying when they inspected it, and half of them (including HL) signed it off as being the genuine article although they did privately express their worry to me about the iPhone I'd painted in.

The blame also applies to all those on the board who should at least have resigned assuming they really were no more than a rubber stamp for Woodfords decisions.

talexuser

I was in the same situation as Moe. Perpetual High Income did me extremely well over 20 years, split the money in half when Woodford left. I did dump Barnett quite a while before jumping Woodford because he was going nowhere. Surely it became obvious by early 2018 Woodford would be extremely unlikely to climb to first quarter of 5 year figures, and sell notices were already in news.

It is a question of opinion how long you let a fund underperform, if it is a sector thing you may well stick it out slightly longer to remain diversified, I generally give it 2 years or so and although have been active for many years, and only passive now because running out of worthwhile top active funds, am by no mean a fund churner, I'm a buy and hold. But Woodford's woes were not a sector problem, and Evenlode looked a better bet.

cogito

More write downs.

The Board of Woodford Patient Capital Trust plc (the "Company") has been notified by Link Fund Solutions Limited ("Link"), that it intends to reduce the valuations of three of the Company's holdings. These valuation adjustments reflect the challenging fundraising environment for these businesses which may impact their ability to or the level at which they may be able to raise capital in the near-term.


Following the valuation adjustments, the Company's net asset value ("NAV") will reduce by approximately 3.1 pence per share and will be reflected in the Company's net asset value as at close of business 25 September 2019 (which will be announced to the market on 26 September 2019).

Sphere Medical is probably one of them as it went into administration earlier this week.

AnotherJoe

Yep:
Embattled fund manager Neil Woodford has been hit by the collapse of Sphere Medical, his first-ever investment in the Woodford Patient Capital (WPCT) investment trust, less than three months after he provided fresh funding to the business.

The troubled diagnostics firm appointed KPMG as administrators on Tuesday after running out of funding.

Woodford has ploughed an estimated £17 million into the business since first investing in 2015 at the launch of his Patient Capital investment trust.

talexuser

In the Borisgraph today, the new UK government is to invest £220 million of taxpayers money into nuclear fusion. Maybe Woodford is a consultant?

AnotherJoe

talexuser wrote: »

In the Borisgraph today, the new UK government is to invest £220 million of taxpayers money into nuclear fusion. Maybe Woodford is a consultant?

LOL but I doubt it, that investment has a chance of paying back.