Investment companies and exchange traded funds                      10,375 
Unquoted investments, including loans of GBP1.4m                      17,246 
Other quoted investments                                            1,464 
                                                                    129,727

STRATEGIC REVIEW

The Strategic Review is designed to provide information primarily about the Company's business and results for the year ended 30th June 2021. The Strategic Review should be read in conjunction with the Chairman's Statement and the Investment Manager's Report, which provide a review of the year's investment activities of the Company and the outlook for the future. The Directors' Report and the Corporate Governance Statement form part of this Strategic Report.

STATUS

The Company is an investment company under section 833 of the Companies Act 2006. It is an Approved Company under the Investment Trust (Approved Company) (Tax) Regulations 2011 (the 'Regulations') and conducts its affairs in accordance with those Regulations so as to retain its status as an investment trust and maintain exemption from liability to United Kingdom capital gains tax.

The Company is a small registered Alternative Investment Fund Manager under the European Union Markets in Financial Instruments Directive.

PURPOSE CULTURE AND VALUES

The Directors acknowledge the expectation under the UK Code on Corporate Governance issued by the Financial Reporting Council in July 2018 (the 'Code') that they formally define a purpose for the Company. The Directors have reviewed this requirement and consider that the Company's purpose is to deliver the Company's stated investment objective to achieve long-term capital growth for the benefit of its investors.

Similarly, the Directors have also considered the Company's culture and values in line with Code requirements. The Board has formed the view that as the Company has no direct employees, and with operational management outsourced to the Investment Manager, the Administrator and the Company Secretary, the Company's culture and values have to be those of the Board. Having a stable composition and established working practices, the Board is defined by experienced membership, trust and robust investment challenge. These are therefore the key characteristics of the Company's culture and values.

STAKEHOLDER RESPONSIBILITIES (S.172 STATEMENT UNDER COMPANIES ACT 2006)

The Directors are aware of their responsibilities to stakeholders under both the Code and legislation through regular governance updates from the Company Secretary. As a UK listed investment trust, the Directors outsource operational management of the Company, including day to day management of the investment portfolio, to third parties. As a consequence, the Directors consider their key stakeholder groups to be limited to the Company's shareholders, its third party advisers and service providers, and individual Board members.

The Company's Articles of Association, the Board's commitment to follow the principles of the Code and the involvement of the independent Company Secretary in Board matters enable the Directors to meet their responsibilities towards individual shareholder groups and Board members. Governance procedures are in place which allow both investors and Directors to ask questions or raise concerns appropriately. The Board is satisfied that those governance procedures mean the Company can act fairly between individual shareholders and takes account of Mr Duffield's significant shareholding. In considering the payment of the minimum dividend required to maintain investment trust tax status, the recommendations to vote in favour of the resolutions at the AGM and the asset allocation within the investment portfolio, the Board assessed the potential benefits to shareholders and the manager of the investment portfolio.

The Board also regularly considers the performance of its independent third party service providers. Those third party service providers in turn have regular opportunities to report on matters meriting the attention of the Board, including in relation to their own performance. The Board is therefore confident that its responsibilities to each of its key stakeholder groups are being discharged effectively.

As the Company does not have any employees, the Board does not consider it necessary to establish means for employee engagement with the Board as required by the latest version of the Code.

INVESTMENT OBJECTIVE AND POLICY

Investment Objective

The Company's investment objective is to achieve long-term capital growth.

Investment Policy

The Company's investment policy is to allocate assets to global investment opportunities through investment in equity, bond, commodity, real estate, currency and other markets. The Company's assets may have significant weightings to any one asset class or market, including cash.

The Company will invest in pooled investment vehicles, exchange traded funds, futures, options, limited partnerships and direct investments in relevant markets. The Company may invest up to 15% of its net assets in direct investments in relevant markets.

The Company will not follow any index with reference to asset classes, countries, sectors or stocks. Aggregate asset class exposure to any one of the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe ex UK, Asia ex Japan, Japan or Emerging Markets and to any individual industry sector will be limited to 50% of the Company's net assets, such values being assessed at the time of investment and for funds by reference to their published investment policy or, where appropriate, the underlying investment exposure.

The Company may invest up to 20% of its net assets in unlisted securities (excluding unquoted pooled investment vehicles) such values being assessed at the time of investment.

The Company will not invest more than 15% of its net assets in any single investment, such values being assessed at the time of investment.

Derivative instruments and forward foreign exchange contracts may be used for the purposes of efficient portfolio management and currency hedging. Derivatives may also be used outside of efficient portfolio management to meet the Company's investment objective. The Company may take outright short positions in relation to up to 30% of its net assets, with a limit on short sales of individual stocks of up to 5% of its net assets, such values being assessed at the time of investment.

The Company may borrow up to 30% of net assets for short-term funding or long-term investment purposes.

No more than 10%, in aggregate, of the value of the Company's total assets may be invested in other closed-ended investment funds except where such funds have themselves published investment policies to invest no more than 15% of their total assets in other listed closed-ended investment funds.

Information on the Company's portfolio of assets with a view to spreading investment risk in accordance with its investment policy.

FINANCIAL REVIEW

Net assets at 30th June 2021 amounted to GBP138,132,000 compared with GBP113,885,000 at 30th June 2020. In the year under review, the NAV per Ordinary share increased by 21.29% from 160.35p to 194.49p, after paying a dividend of 1.4p per share.

The Group's gross revenue fell to GBP1,522,000 (2020: GBP2,419,000), mainly as a result of dividends received being adversely impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic did not impact dividends significantly last year, with the full impact being felt in the year under review. After deducting expenses and taxation, the revenue profit for the year was GBP429,000 (2020: GBP1,325,000).

Total expenses for the year were almost unchanged at GBP1,093,000 after an increased management fee (2020: GBP1,094,000 before the performance fee of GBP623,000). In the year under review the investment management fee increased to GBP774,000 (2020: GBP697,000), reflecting the Company's increasing NAV throughout the period. Last year a performance fee of GBP623,000 was payable in respect of the period to 31st December 2019. Since then, the performance fee arrangement has ceased. The performance fee was allocated to the Capital account in accordance with the Company's accounting policy.

Historically, dividends have not formed a central part of the Company's investment objective. The increased investment in income focused funds over the last few years has enabled the Directors to declare an increased dividend in recent years. The Company's fall in dividend income this year is seen as temporary, and the Directors have decided to utilise retained earnings to maintain the dividend. The Directors propose a final dividend of 1.40p per Ordinary share in respect of the year ended 30th June 2021 (2020: 1.40p). If approved at the Annual General Meeting, the dividend will be paid on 30th November 2021 to shareholders on the register at the close of business on 5th November 2021 (ex-dividend 4th November 2021).

The primary source of the Company's funding is shareholder funds.

While the future performance of the Company is dependent, to a large degree, on the performance of international financial markets, which in turn are subject to many external factors, the Board's intention is that the Company will continue to pursue its stated investment objective in accordance with the strategy outlined above. Further comments on the short-term outlook for the Company are set out in the Chairman's Statement and the Investment Manager's report.

PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT AND KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS

Throughout the year the Group's investments included seven funds managed by the Investment Manager (2020: seven). No investment management fees were payable directly by the Company in respect of these investments.

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September 24, 2021 02:00 ET (06:00 GMT)