Philip Matthews has been at Jupiter since 1999, but it wasn’t until 2006 that he was given the reins of the Jupiter Growth & Income Fund. Since then he has returned 28.5% and beaten the sector benchmark. Given the market turmoil in the last three years, that’s a pretty solid performance.
Matthews offers a “compelling mix of finding income and capturing growth”, says Citywire’s Jonathan Miller. “He focuses on company valuations and tries to find undervalued firms with a secure level of profitability. He also targets cash-generative firms that can provide healthy dividends.”
Matthews himself describes the approach as “growth at a reasonable price”. At the start of the year Matthews decided that pharmaceuticals looked undervalued and beefed up holdings in GlaxoSmithKline and AstraZeneca. Both are now in the fund’s top ten holdings.
The faltering recovery since the start of the year is his biggest headache. In response he has been selling off cyclical holdings, such as miners, that he felt were overvalued. Given the recent pullback in the mining sector, that approach now seems justified.
With a difficult economic outlook, Matthews maintains that “the portfolio’s defensiveness will continue”. Still, Matthews is optimistic that he can find good investment opportunities in well-capitalised companies with resilient earnings streams.
“In uncertain times this disciplined approach of investing in undervalued companies, backed by a higher dividend level than the market, will leave investors well placed over the long term,” says Miller.
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Jupiter Growth & Income Fund top ten holdings
| Name of holding | % of assets |
|---|---|
| BP | 7.3% |
| GlaxoSmithKline | 7.2% |
| Vodafone Group | 6.6% |
| AstraZeneca PLC | 5.3% |
| BG Group | 3.7% |
| HSBC Holdings | 3.6% |
| Sage Group | 3.5% |
| Balfour Beatty | 3.2% |
| Unilever | 3.1% |
| Centrica PLC | 2.7% |