During the quarter the Fund was aided by overweight positions in both Consumer Discretionary and Staples related businesses, with the United Malt Group takeover being all but confirmed at the time of writing, the Fund has now exited this position. Overweight positions in Breville and Wesfarmers Ltd also aided performance following strong results in August. Healthcare has been the worst performing sector over the last 12 months and the fund has increased its weighting here. During the quarter, the Fund benefitted from having no position in Resmed and being Underweight CSL, whilst returns were weighed on by Overweight positions in ACL and Ramsay Healthcare.
Reporting season is what we often refer to as our report card and we were pleased to again outperform the S&P/ASX 300 during the August reporting season. Positioning, cost of debt, margins and outlook statements were dominant themes, all are likely to be front of mind as we move through the remainder of this financial year.
After an extended period of stagnation in our market to start CY23, largely based on the hope of a perfectly executed soft landing by global central banks, the September quarter brought with it an uptick in volatility across asset classes. Bond yields increased markedly, with the Australian 10 year bond yield now 300bps higher than this time two years ago. Whilst moves from various central banks, including in Japan, have had ongoing ramifications for risk assets globally
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