holland44
08 Nov 2017
Why the rise? So, after long periods in the doldrums - OIG is my worst-performing investment over the last 18 months - this trust has suddenly woken up! From 685 in early October to 775 today, with the discount narrowing from 21% to around 15%. There's no RNS news of any significance that I can see, and OIG's website is useless. MJ Gleeson (10.5% of the portfolio) has suddenly been doing very well, and Quantum Pharma (9.4%) has gone from 60 to 85 since mid-August, so perhaps "the market" has finally noticed and decided it's time to bring OIG's discount more into line with other UK small-cap trusts.Does anyone have any better ideas?
sage in the hills
26 May 2017
Re: discount nimbo 1 ...... ....when is v soon please ? ....SAGE
nimbo1
06 May 2017
Re: discount fact sheet is historic and not up to date.look at the website - before the strong performance of some of the underlying holdings the discount was sat at over 21% on Friday. Probably 23% now. I purchased Friday pm - all other smaller companies trusts have made a run for it and I expect this to follow v soon. [link]
marconiman
05 May 2017
Re: discount Discount = 17.28% according to the Factsheet.
sllab
05 May 2017
discount According to my calculation this trades on a more than 20% discount. Is there something I do not see or is this a gift at this price?
sage in the hills
10 Apr 2017
Re: Quite a nice little trust this ? ..... ..... funnily enough Holland44....Before you posted this , i also had moved some money here from SEC !!! ...SAGE
holland44
24 Feb 2017
Re: Quite a nice little trust this ? ..... It's really struggled over the last year since Brexit, but performance before that was excellent.I found it via John Burford's "Thematic" portfolio: he's invested in OIG as he likes its activist private-equity-style approach, which he views as one of his "themes" alongside UK trusts like SDV or AGIT that specialise in finding higher yields amongst the small caps. I had recently sold out of SEC - another with a private equity approach - after it had a dramatic re-rating and moved to a premium, and was looking for a new home for my UK small caps cash.OIG is really a UK small company trust, so is in the wrong AIC category: interestingly its sister company NAS also run by Harwood Capital was recently re-categorised in the US small companies sector.Another interesting recent development is that Stuart Widdowson, former main manager at SEC, has just joined Harwood Capital and is in the process of starting up a new trust; perhaps this will bring some changes to OIG and NAS, or it may just sit alongside them.
sage in the hills
23 Feb 2017
Quite a nice little trust this ? ..... .... how do you guys and gals rate this one then ? .....SAGE
The OTC-man
20 Oct 2015
Re: Introduction I've been topping up OIG ever bought it for my new SIPP in the beginning of the year. I do follow John Baron loosely on selecting investment trusts (he had OIG in his portfolio) but he has too many I believe, too much finely spread risk. I noticed that OIG takes a big step up every few months without any reference to any index (as they don’t follow any) so I filled up more, also in my ISA. "Overweight" but that is my fafourite method. OIG have given themselves a mandate to take an activist approach, at least an active role, OIG behaves more like a true hedge fund than an constrained investment trust and I like it! THey also use all financial instruments whenver needed, not just long postions. And today the buy/sell prices moved up again another 4-5% after the discount getting bigger and bigger, and who knows, it may go up a bit more before it stabilises on its next level. Who needs private equity funds when there is OIG?
holland44
03 Sep 2015
Introduction There hasn't been any discussion about this trust for a long while, so I thought I'd kick things off.I was led to this trust by John Baron's analysis at [link] was looking for a small companies trust with a good track record and a US flavour, without being a worldwide generalist like FCS (in which I already invest). Investing in OIG was rather a shot in the dark, but John Baron has good judgement and plenty of experience, and the trust has done very well in 2015, whilst still retaining a decent 13.5 discount. It has a similar focused private-equity approach to SEC, which I first invested in when it had an 18% discount, but is now on an 8% premium which makes me nervous (JB has recently sold most of his SEC holdings for this reason).OIG has jumped 7.21% today; I've no idea why, but like SEC it tends to go through long periods of stable prices, then sudden leaps, presumably on good news of some kind or purchases by a large investor.Here's John Baron's analysis:"OIG invests in small and medium sized quoted and unquoted companies, mostly in the UK but also in the US. Its approach is a little different to other more ‘mainstream’ smaller company investment trusts in that it seeks companies with strong business models but which may, for a variety of reasons, have factors constraining their performance. Taking an activist approach as a shareholder, it works with managements to crystallise the inherent value. This process is helped by its expertise in spanning the public/private equity divide. As such, OIG’s portfolio is more concentrated than most as the emphasis is on taking reasonable stakes and knowing the companies very well indeed. It’s an approach which has paid off over the years. Under the stewardship of Christopher Mills, performance has been very good. When I last looked at the end of November, OIG has produced a total return of 13%, 89% and 130% over one, three and five years respectively. This compares well against both peers and the various indices.And yet, it still sits on a generous discount. When I first mentioned OIG in last month’s column, the discount was around 25%. Since then it has narrowed and, at time of writing, is now around 16%. However, this still represents good value given its track record, which is why I have topped-up the holding during November.Looking forward, there are a number of positives. I remain of the view that portfolios should be overweight smaller companies over the longer term. OIG’s approach is particularly well suited when applied to this under-researched area of the market, and this should continue to serve it well – especially given an earnings environment which will remain difficult. With liquidity effectively around 13%, powder is being kept dry for further opportunities.Furthermore, its expertise and flexible mandate, both in terms of geography and in crossing the public/private divide, will remain a relative strength. The unquoted element comprises less than 10% of the portfolio at present, but historically OIG has a good record at crystallising value from such investments. There remains one vital component which I always look for when seeking unfashionable trusts – managements with sizeable stakes. Christopher owns around 30% of North Atlantic Smaller Companies (NAS) which in turn owns 42% of OIG. A further 1% of OIG is owned directly. Such a healthy stake strongly aligns the manager’s interests with that of shareholders – it is in everyone’s interest that the discount narrows over time."
