The Tip Sheet
The Telegraph thinks Aurora Investment Trust is a buy, while This is Money offers up a possible solution for those investors wanting to jump on the Nvidia bandwagon but fear they have missed the boat – investment trusts that hold Nvidia but trade at discounts to net assets.

ByFrank Buhagiar

Questor: Believe in this FTSE 100-beating hidden gem as Gary Channon has
The strapline accompanying the above article is ‘Investment trust bargain: this fund has had a phoenix-like recovery’. The phoenix analogy is appropriate for two Firstly, the fund in question is Aurora Investment Trust (ARR) which back in January 2016 was the UK’s worst-performing fund. January 2016 was the month when value investor, Gary Channon, took over the management of the fund and since then ARR has generated a share price tota return of +80.7%. That’s a little off the FTSE All Share’s +86.2% but, as The Telegraph’s tipster explains, this reflects the discount to net assets at which the share price has been trading at on account of UK stocks falling out of favour. Still, enough there to warrant the phoenix-like recovery tag. If that wasn’t enough, the investment management firm run by Channon is called Phoenix Asset Management Partners!
Questor points the finger at Channon’s value approach for the turnaround in fortunes – a focus on investing in a small number of intensively researched stocks he believed to be trading well below their intrinsic value. The fund holds the likes of sports retailer Frasers Group, housebuilder Barratt Developments and investment broker Hargreaves Lansdown which recently found itself the subject of a £5.4bn bid from private equity. ARR also has a holding in another Channon-run fund, Castelnau (CGL), the shares of which recently jumped +30% on the back of a +46% increase in the value of Dignity – the funeral services group accounts for over 70% of CGL’s assets.
Questor sees Castelnau’s revaluation as ‘an endorsement of Mr Channon’s approach and reiterate our belief in Aurora, which is 13.5pc invested in the sister fund, giving it a decent exposure to Dignity amid a more balanced portfolio that the manager believes could grow a further 130pc before being fairly valued. Questor says: buy.’
This is Money: The investment trusts to back Nvidia and the AI revolution at a discount
Earlier this year, Nvidia became the world’s most valuable company. The shares have since fallen back but as at the date of the above article had still put on +161% since January 2024 and were up a near +3000% over the past five years. All well and good for holders of shares in the US semiconductor giant who are sitting on spectacular gains. But what about those investors who’d like to jump on the AI bandwagon – Nvidia controls 90% of the market for ‘accelerator’ microchips that power generative AI – but fear Nvidia could be a bubble waiting to burst?
This is Money offers up a solution: ‘It is possible to acquire a stake in Nvidia and the other Silicon Valley names through investment trusts whose shares are at a discount to their net asset values (NAVs).’ The article goes on to highlight well-known names such as Baillie Gifford US Growth, F&C IT, JPMorgan Global Growth & Income, Monks and the soon-to-be combined Alliance and Witan. But “some lesser-known names are also backing the Nvidia supernova’ too. These include:
Allianz Technology – Nvidia 9% of assets; shares trading at 6% discount. Fund also holds the likes of Apple, Meta and Microsoft.
Canadian General Investments – Nvidia 8.5% of assets; shares trading at a 41% discount. Fund holds a diverse range of investments including railway companies.
Manchester & London– Nvidia 32% of assets; shares trading at a 15.5% discount to net assets. This is Money notes fund manager Mark Sheppard holds 57% of the shares, offering ‘considerable incentive to shrink the discount.’
Martin Currie Global Portfolio – Nvidia 9% of assets; shares trading at a relatively small 2.85% discount. The fund holds a number of non-tech investments such as L’Oreal. ‘This may be an option if you feel that your portfolio contains too much tech.’
Polar Capital Technology – Nvidia 10% of assets; shares trading at a 6.72% discount.
Scottish Mortgage – Nvidia 9% of ‘this £11.5billion FTSE 100-member trust whose discount has reduced from 20 per cent last summer to 9 per cent.’
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