Best and Worst: Japan and gold funds shine: Unit Trusts
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Your support makes all the difference.BIG movements in the Japanese stock market and the stirrings of the gold price have put unit trusts invested in these sectors at the top of the one-year league tables, writes Maria Scott.
The Japanese market has benefited from a range of government measures to pump life into the economy and restore investor confidence.
However, sterling investors in Japanese unit trusts have gained as much from the weakness of the pound as from the rise in the market. The Nikkei Average rose 20.3 per cent over the past year, but this translated into nearly 63 per cent for a sterling investor.
Steve Harker, manager of the Prudential Japanese trust, says that his fund did well by buying bank shares in the second quarter of 1992. It also profited from investment in the main Japanese telecommunications company, NTT. But Mr Harker is cautious about the prospects for Japan in the near future. 'The index has gone up by 110 per cent since last August . . . The next move upwards will not happen in the short term.'
Mercury's Gold & General fund has benefited from renewed interest in gold, and also from fund manager Julian Baring's heavy buying of South African mining shares, where profits were boosted by currency movements.
There is no consensus about the future of the gold price and mining shares, so exceptional performances by trusts invested in this sector should be viewed with caution.
Nick Hodgson, head of UK sales and marketing at Thornton Unit Managers, admitted that Thornton Smaller American Companies had made bad choices and had put too much cash into Canada, but said this was being remedied.
-------------------------------------------------------- BEST AND WORST: UNIT TRUSTS -------------------------------------------------------- The best Pounds 1 Prudential Japanese 178.55 2 PM Japan Growth 172.96 3 Mercury Gold & General 172.08 4 Allied Dunbar Japan 164.93 5 Dunedin Japan Growth 164.43 The worst 1306 S&P UK Smaller Companies Growth 89.10 1307 PC CAM British Growth 88.21 1308 Aetna Iberian Growth 85.91 1309 Bell Court UK & European 85.67 1310 Thornton American Smaller Companies 73.61 --------------------------------------------------------
The chart shows the value of pounds 100 invested over one year to 1 May, offer to bid, with income reinvested
Source: Micropal
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