continued...
Inglis-Jones says: “The current process is an evolution of what Gary and I have been doing
together since our time at Flemings. When we arrived at Polar we developed it further, and now it’s even more detailed – so it’s not just a question of arriving at Liontrust and saying, ‘let’s start afresh’.”
West, who worked with Bill Pattisson during his time at JPMF, first heard that a position might be opening for the pair when he wrote a letter to his friend expressing his faith in Pattisson’s process.
The process was under increasing pressure from people who were questioning its validity because, as will occasionally happen with any rigid process, it did not suit the short-term market.
West says: “A chunk of money was taken out of the fund at what I thought was the worst possible time, and I wrote a letter to Bill saying I thought his process would bottom out soon.
It did. We got chatting after that and it developed from there.”
“It was a big decision to jump ship. Polar was a great place to be, but we felt that Liontrust would offer us a greater breadth of product – we’ve launched the long-only unit trust, a long/short portfolio for professional investors only and other variants will follow – and we felt that Liontrust could offer us a longer-term commitment to our process,” West explains.
Inglis-Jones adds: “I don’t think there’s a single other company I would have joined. What’s
unique here is the single-minded approach to the importance of investment process, and with that comes a commitment to the long term, which is rare these days, especially in hedge funds.”
This commitment is typical of Liontrust as a management group that is dedicated to supporting
managers that it believes have the talent to shine. This commitment extends to the way in which it allows key staff to work.
Jeremy Lang, for example, works a few weeks of the year from his house in Whistler, Canada – managing money during UK business hours and skiing the rest of the time. Anthony Cross, Liontrust’s UK small cap. fund manager, spends two days a week working from his home in Perthshire.
West and Inglis-Jones are no different, and it suits their approach. Both managers approach the same stocks from different angles, working separately at first and then comparing notes to come up with a final shortlist for their portfolios.
When is a chair not a chair?
