AI Shares

Owner-operated or family-run companies think in generations, not in quarters

Solid balance sheets, high innovative strength and safety awareness have a positive effect on the share price

Companies impress with high ESG scores

Explained in 90 seconds

Please find a more detailed description of share classes here.

Investment Focus

ISIN-No. LU2811956387

The Fund is actively managed and invests in small capitalized, listed owner-managed companies in Europe where an entrepreneur/founder family holds at least a 20% of a company’s voting rights, thereby exerting signif. influence. The team pursues a fundamental, bottom-up approach in identifying the most attractive founder-controlled companies while maintaining an investment portfolio diversified by country, sub-sector and style (Value, GARP, Growth).

Indexed performance (as at: 16.08.2024)

NAV: EUR 115.83 (15.08.2024)

01 Jan 2010 - 01 Jan 2010

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AI-EUR

Benchmark

Cumulative performance (16.08.2024)

	AI-EUR	Benchmark
1M	-5.50%	-2.31%
YTD	n.a.	n.a.
1 year	n.a.	n.a.
Since Inception	-7.34%	-3.78%

Facts & Key figures

Investment Focus

The fund’s aim is to achieve capital growth in the long term, is actively managed and invests in small capitalized, listed owner-managed companies in Europe where an entrepreneur or a founder family holds at least a 20% of a company’s voting rights. The qualities of these companies – a focused business model, fast decision-making processes and a strong corporate culture – go hand in hand with efficient innovation, high product quality and strong customer loyalty. The corresponding impact on the share price is demonstrably positive. The fund’s Management Team offers a wealth of experience in this investment segment and has built up an extensive network with entrepreneurs throughout the sector. It pursues a fundamental, bottom-up approach in identifying the most attractive foundercontrolled companies with a small market capitalization while maintaining an investment portfolio of 35 to 45 stocks diversified by country, sub-sector and style (Value, GARP, Growth). The fund takes ESG factors into consideration while implementing the aforementioned investment objectives.Show moreShow less

Investment suitability & Risk

SRI

Low risk

High risk

The Fund’s investment objective is to generate attractive and competitive capital growth in the long term. It is therefore particularly suited to investors with an investment horizon of at least 5 years who want to enhance their portfolio diversification with investments in European small capitalized founder-controlled companies. The Fund displays the typical risks associated with equity investments in European small caps.

General Information

Investment Manager	Bellevue Asset Management AG
Custodian	CACEIS BANK, LUXEMBOURG BRANCH
Fund Administrator	CACEIS BANK, LUXEMBOURG BRANCH
Auditor	PriceWaterhouseCoopers
Launch date	30.06.2011
Year end closing	30. Jun
NAV Calculation	Daily "Forward Pricing"
Cut of time	15:00 CET
Management Fee	0.90%
Subscription Fee (max.)	5.00%
Performance Fee	10.00% (with High Water Mark)
ISIN number	LU2811956387
Valor number	135041307
Bloomberg	BFLESAI LX
WKN	A40D27
Total expense ratio (TER)	1.36% (31.07.2024)

Legal Information

Legal form	Luxembourg UCITS V SICAV
SFDR category	Article 8

Key data (31.07.2024, base currency EUR)

Beta	0.86
Volatility	16.30
Tracking error	6.49
Active share	89.74
Correlation	0.93
Sharpe ratio	-0.07
Information ratio	-0.21
Jensen's alpha	-1.33
No. of positions	44

Portfolio

Top 10 positions

Subsea 7

Burckhardt Compression

Fuchs

Swissquote

iShares Europe Prprty Yield ETF

Wartsila

Flughafen Zürich

Nordex

Sopra Steria

Bankinter

4.1%

3.6%

3.5%

3.3%

3.2%

Market capitalization

0 - 1 bn

1 - 2 bn

2 - 5 bn

5 - 15 bn

Others

16.4%

12.9%

34.1%

32.7%

3.9%

Geographic breakdown

Switzerland

Spain

France

Sweden

Germany

Finland

Norway

Italy

Austria

Ireland

Other

Portugal

Cash

15.3%

14.9%

10.2%

9.5%

7.8%

6.6%

6.4%

4.8%

3.2%

1.7%

1.4%

3.4%

Breakdown by sector

Industrials

Financials

Materials

Consumer Staples

Healthcare

Energy

Consumer Discretion.

Communication Services

Real Estate

Utilities

Cash

28.3%

15.0%

12.6%

9.2%

7.4%

6.6%

5.2%

4.2%

3.6%

3.2%

1.3%

3.4%

Benefits & Risks

Benefits

Above-average top line growth driven by high innovation and strong pricing power.
Higher operating margins on the back of high market share ("Champion in the niche") combined with good cost discipline.
More conservatively financed, lower debt exposure and a higher risk capacity compared to non-family businesses.
Multi-award-winning management team with a long and successful track record investing in owner-run firms.
Entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs – the Bellevue Group is itself an owner-run company with the majority of shares held by employees.

Risks

The fund actively invests in equities. Equities are subject to price fluctuations and so are also exposed to the risk of price losses.
Shares in smaller businesses are generally traded in lower volumes and are subject to bigger price fluctuations than larger enterprises.
The fund invests in foreign currencies, which means a corresponding degree of currency risk against the reference currency.
The fund may invest a proportion of its assets in financial instruments that might under certain circumstances have a relatively low level of liquidity, which can in turn affect the fund’s liquidity.
The fund may engage in derivatives transactions. The increased opportunities gained come with an increased risk of losses.

Review / Outlook

European small and mid caps, as measured by the MSCI Europe Small Cap ex-UK, rose 2.7% in July outperforming the broader market (SXXR +1.4%). July was a month of two halves, with the S&P 500 first hitting record highs. Later in the month, risk assets began to turn as US consumer confidence showed signs of weakness. The Magnificent 7 experienced significant share price losses sending the S&P down more than 10% from its peak. Bonds rallied as speculation increased around a Fed rate cut rate in September, particularly after the US CPI came out below estimates. The Eurozone flash PMI contracted to 50.1 in July, with both services and manufacturing declining sequentially. In a defensive sector rotation, construction and materials (+7.0%), banks (6.0%) and personal care, drug and grocery stores (+4.0%) performed best while chemicals (-2.7%), insurance (-2.3%), travel and leisure (-2.1%) lagged the most.

Against this backdrop, the fund declined by 0.3% (EUR / B shares), underperforming its benchmark by 300 bps. This brings the performance to 11.1% for the first seven month of 2024, a 387 bps beat vs the benchmark.

Top detractors in the month were Husqvarna (-16.6%), BESI (-23.7%) and CTT Systems (-16.9%). Husqvarna posted a weak quarter with negative sales growth and EBIT 20% below expectations. The disappointment was driven by tough macro combined with unfavourable weather. A key factor was the shrinking market shares in residential robotic where competition at the entry price level is biting. The company is taking measures, but effects are not to be expected until next season. The position is under review. After being a top performer in June, BESI turned around in the sector rotation. The Q3 guidance miss overshadowed strong Q2 results. More crucial for the BESI story is the meaningful progress being made in hybrid bonding. CTT peaked early June with a 68% ytd performance. Since shares have experience a sharp correction as supply constraints at Boeing and Airbus constrain OEM sales more than expected. Along with tough comps, the company delivered 3% top line in Q2 and a 7% EBIT decline. Nevertheless margins remained very solid at 38% due to CTT’s fantastic monopolistic business model with strong after sales contribution.

Top performers in the month were Nordex (+22.7%), Nexans (+16.2%) and Burckhardt Compression (+7.8%). Thanks to a 21% top line growth Nordex' EBITDA surprised positively further cementing the company MT 8% EBITDA target. Nexans delivered an H1 EBITDA 14% above expectations thanks to the very strong growth in generation and transmission and a value over volume strategy that is paying off with momentum in both medium and low voltage, spurring a FY guidance upgrade. Burckhardt released good FY 23/24 results in the beginning of June. Order intake was 10% above expectations and the company slightly raised MT top-line guidance for FY 2027/28. Orders are slowly normalizing after two very strong years but activity remains strong, especially in the field of energy transition applications.

The European equity opportunity is slowly sinking in. At the same time, European small and mid caps benefit too as the asset class is offering an interesting entry point with valuations below their large caps peers for the first time since 2008. The massive valuation gap with European equities trading at 14x forward earnings, compared to 21x for the S&P 500 speaks for the region. What could be the triggers to a rerating? China seems less bad and we have witnessed some positive macro data. The Caixin China General Manufacturing PMI increased to 51.1 in March, the fifth straight month of growth in factory activity. Copper reached an 11-month high. Also, compared to the Fed, the European Central Bank finds itself in a less complicated situation. The business cycles of the US and Europe have decorrelated a lot in the last 6-12 months and while growth expectations rise in the US, it is the opposite in Germany and a large part of Europe. Finally the March BofA's global fund survey showed the largest increase in allocations to European equities since June 2020. After 3 consecutive years of outflows, it’s time to reconsider European small and mid caps.

Dokumente

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ESG

Awards

Co-Lead Portfolio Manager
Birgitte Olsen
Birgitte Olsen, CFA, Senior Portfolio Manager Equities Europe, joined Bellevue Asset Management in 2008. Prior to that, she was Deputy Head of Portfolio Management Equities Europe at Generali Investments in Cologne for more than nine years. She worked as a Fund Manager (DE and Scandinavia) at Vontobel Asset Management in Zurich in 1997 and 1998. Birgitte Olsen started her career in the financial industry in 1994 as a sell-side analyst at Bank am Bellevue covering the insurance and pharmaceutical sectors. She holds a degree in Finance and Accounting from the University of St. Gallen.
Co-Lead Portfolio Manager
Laurent Picard
Laurent Picard joined Bellevue Asset Management in 2018. Prior to that, he was an Financial consultant for start-ups in the internet/tech sector. From 2009 to 2016 he was a senior equity research analyst for media at Société Générale, having joined from UBS Warburg, where he was an equity analyst for IT Services and Software and a strategist specialized on the French markets. Laurent Picard graduated from Paris X University and ESSEC business school and holds a Master of Financial Techniques.
Senior Product Specialist
Loreno Ferrari
Loreno Ferrari joined Bellevue Asset Management in 2018 and is a Senior Product Specialist. Previously, he spent 3 years as an Investment Specialist at UBS Asset Management and 8 years at Zürcher Kantonalbank, most recently as an Investment Advisor. Loreno holds a Bachelor of Science (BSc) in Business Administration (UAS) Zurich with a Specialization in Banking and Finance. He is a Certified International Investment Analyst (CIIA) and holds the Certificate in ESG Investing from CFA Institute.