Orbis Investments.

FrugaiMacDugal

Does anybody use or has used Orbis  Investments?

Was thinking of having a punt on Global Equity Fund.

Is the 'We only charge a fee when the fund beats its benchmark' a good system?

Would it be better to buy through Orbis or my Scottish Widows account, I already have S&S Isa with SW.

Alexland

Here's a couple of my Orbis threads from 2018 when they were offing signup cashback

Looking at the current 5 and 10 year graphs on their website their global equity fund has slightly beaten MSCI World but there were plenty of times when they were behind - it very much depends on the start/end date on the graph.

Their balanced fund did well avoiding bonds and using alternative types of diversification and they were one of the first fund managers I follow that was calling out exactly what would happen in the 2022 bond crash.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5775047/orbis-100-match-offer-now-ended/p1

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5810758/orbis-100-match-offer-now-ended/p1

I don't have anything with Orbis anymore but their no fees on the JISA offer got me investing for my kids for the first time. Overall a happy customer.

[Deleted User]

I hold the Orbis Cautious fund, the FM, Alec Cutler, is well regarded, albeit he manages the fund(s) from Bermuda!

dunstonh

Would it be better to buy through Orbis or my Scottish Widows account, I already have S&S Isa with SW.

What are the terms of your SW account compared with Orbis?  (SW terms often depend on where you buy their platform from)

Beddie

I invest in the Orbis Global Balanced fund via Lloyds share dealing - happy so far! It suits my risk profile and I like the fee structure.

FrugaiMacDugal

dunstonh said:

Would it be better to buy through Orbis or my Scottish Widows account, I already have S&S Isa with SW.

What are the terms of your SW account compared with Orbis?  (SW terms often depend on where you buy their platform from)

It's just the basic setup since IWeb switch.

Kryten_the_Titan

I have dipped my toe in to Orbis Global Balanced (fixed fee variant) on a SIPP platform.

RSNut

Thanks to @Alexland for his post in 2018. I invested £100 in the Orbis offer and £20k in their ISA for both myself and my wife. The respective amounts were placed in the Orbis Global Equity Fund.

The current value of the initial £100 is now £439.82 held in a Standard Investment Account.

The current Stocks and Shares ISA value is now £44,958.52. Therefore our joint holdings total over £90k.

The total annualised money weighted rate of return of our accounts since first invested in the Orbis funds in January 2018 until December 2025 is reported on our statements as a rate of 11.2%. Calculated on the basis of all the money invested in the funds, all investment returns, and of any fees charged.

The usual caveats apply with respect to past performance.

Orbis have been very efficient in supplying regular statements and have helpful telephone support when required, therefore I am very happy as a customer to have invested directly with them, and to have held the accounts over the past seven years as part of our portfolio.

thunderroad88

I have 10% of my equity holdings in Orbis Global Balanced (in my SW ISA). I think the fixed fee option is better as I don’t think they set themselves a very challenging benchmark to measure against so you’ll most likely be paying 40% of quite a bit of over performance. Look at the difference in performance between the fixed fee and performance fee options and you’ll see the difference being a simple fixed fee makes. 

Alexland

thunderroad88 said:

I have 10% of my equity holdings in Orbis Global Balanced (in my SW ISA). I think the fixed fee option is better as I don’t think they set themselves a very challenging benchmark to measure against so you’ll most likely be paying 40% of quite a bit of over performance. Look at the difference in performance between the fixed fee and performance fee options and you’ll see the difference being a simple fixed fee makes. 

Although the performance fee sounds good they are not basing it on long term performance but on specific measurement periods so provided they have a portfolio that behaves differently to the market the fee will still be charged on plenty of occasions (and is high enough to cover the occasions it's not charged) even if the fund long term underperforms. It took me a little while to work that out. Still I'm pleased investors have had a good return since I suggested the cashback offer in 2018 - similar to the return from the MSCI All World index.

Therealdisraeli

Their fee structure is opaque and I cannot find any info on how much exactly is taken off during periods of outperformance - they say up to 40% whic gets used to compensate the fund during underperformance. Then all you're doing dampening the upsides and downsides, minus a fee (which is unknown), which is not the point of a long term equity fund in my view.