Key points
- Much has changed in the investment world since Trust was launched in 2004
- For 50 editions, we’ve been sharing our trust managers’ thoughts about the companies and themes that excite them most
- Greater diversity of managers and boards and more transparency are some of the shifts since we first published
As with any investment, your capital is at risk.
Investment trusts have come a long way in the 21 years this magazine has been sharing our managers’ thoughts with you, our loyal readers.
As the UK’s largest steward of these uniquely flexible ways of investing your money, Baillie Gifford has led from the front in communicating with shareholders.
Over 50 issues, we have explained how our investment teams anticipate opportunities in exciting, often disruptive companies and try to turn them to your advantage.
Rather than pondering big macroeconomic matters or prophesying market movements, Trust has worked within the grain of the firm’s ‘bottom-up’ investment style, drilling into the stories behind exceptional businesses and their far-sighted founders and leaders.
From the start, we’ve channelled the thoughts of our investment trust managers on how they could best outperform over the long term.
The firms featured in our first 50 issues were often world-changers: Amazon, Tesla, Spotify, Alphabet, Nintendo, Tencent, MercardoLibre, to name a few.
We’ve also highlighted private company holdings, such as SpaceX and TikTok owner ByteDance, the benefits of whose stellar growth ordinary investors can only access through the investment trust structure.
And we’ve consistently highlighted less familiar names – Joby Aviation is the latest example – that we think are set to upend how we live and work.
Alongside these exceptional companies and the people behind them, we’ve featured some big thinkers who have helped shape our view of the world, from the late, great Prof Hans Rosling to Prof Sir John Kay.
Changed times
Trust launched in 2004, the same year as Facebook, Gmail, EU eastward expansion and President George W Bush’s second term. Baillie Gifford, still four years from its centenary, was regaining momentum after a dip in the dotcom crash and starting to meet its newly broadband-connected clients online.
As conceived by Ian Bruce, now our head of marketing campaigns, the magazine was about “insight and analysis”. It was pitched “between formal and informal”, to “have articles with a long shelf life” and make “effective use of visuals”.
It set out to tell the stories of the individual trusts, some dating from Victorian and Edwardian days, and describe how they oriented themselves towards the most exciting growth companies of tomorrow.
Even as recently as 2004, a “customer magazine” that wasn’t just a sales factsheet was a novelty in the investment world, which had never seen much call to communicate beyond the formalities demanded of all public companies.
Our first cover story, presciently enough, was on “Investment options in China”, which, we reported, had “recently begun to offer genuine and varied opportunities for overseas investors”.
A growth story
Back then, the eight closed-ended funds Baillie Gifford managed contained just under £3bn. Now we look after nearly £20bn of your money spread across 11 trusts.
Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust is responsible for more than half that sum. The Trust, which seeded Colonel Augustus Baillie and Carlyle Gifford’s innovative investment partnership in 1909, is now one of Scotland’s biggest listed companies.
Meanwhile, a growing appreciation of the benefits of investment trusts is reflected across the industry. The amount invested in UK stock-market listed trusts quintupled to £271bn between 2004 and today.
Besides managing more of your hard-earned wealth, what else has changed? One major shift is an increased appreciation of the benefits of having trust managers and boards from diverse backgrounds.
Another is the now industry-wide appetite for transparency and open dialogue with shareholders.
As Annabel Brodie-Smith, director of the Association of Investment Companies (AIC), puts it: “Gone are the days when the thud of the annual report and accounts landing on your doormat was all shareholders could expect.
“Now, investors want regular, easily accessible updates about their trusts, online and via social media. But the popularity of Trust shows that they still want a quality printed product they can keep around, in the kitchen in my case, and read in more depth when they can.”
Thank you for reading over the years and letting us know what you like – and sometimes like less – about your magazine. We’ll keep working to live up to our title and your high expectations in editions and decades to come.
The first 49 covers
Important information
The views expressed in this article should not be considered as advice or a recommendation to buy, sell or hold a particular investment. The article contains information and opinion on investments that does not constitute independent investment research, and is therefore not subject to the protections afforded to independent research.
Some of the views expressed are not necessarily those of Baillie Gifford. Investment markets and conditions can change rapidly, therefore the views expressed should not be taken as statements of fact nor should reliance be placed on them when making investment decisions.
Baillie Gifford & Co Limited is wholly owned by Baillie Gifford & Co. Both companies are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and are based at: Calton Square, 1 Greenside Row, Edinburgh EH1 3AN.
The investment trusts managed by Baillie Gifford & Co Limited are listed on the London Stock Exchange and are not authorised or regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority.
Key Information Documents are available by visiting bailliegifford.com
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