In January, the HNW Australian Equity Portfolio gained +0.37%, trailing the benchmark return of 1.8%. Equity markets in January were driven by macroeconomic noise, which drowned out the few company-specific updates. Investors were bombarded with news over the month, such as the abduction of the President of Venezuela, tariff hikes on South Korea, threats by the US to seize Greenland (which saw a 2% decline in equity markets that was quickly forgotten), escalating tensions in Iran, record prices for Gold and Silver and domestic violence/protests in Minnesota.
This mix of events saw a sharp rotation into resource companies on the ASX led by BHP (hitting an all-time high despite a -3% fall in the iron ore price!). If you take Resources out of the index, the rest of the ASX200 fell 1% in January.
Over the month, positions in WhiteHaven (+14%), Dyno Nobel (+9%), Woodside (+8%), MinRes (+5%) and CSL (+5%) added value. On the negative side of the ledger, Ampol (-10%) hurt performance along with not owning BHP (+11%), which alone cost 0.97% in relative performance. Ampol’s share price was weak despite guiding to a +30% increase in profits for 2025, with some analysts concerned about a fall in low-margin fuel sales.
In January, the HNW Australian Equities Income Focus Portfolio had a muted month, down -0.24%. Positions in WhiteHaven (+14%), Dyno Nobel (+9%), Woodside (+8%), Deterra (+4%) and Macquarie (+4%) added value. On the negative side of the ledger the Portfolio’s exposure to Ampol, along with “interest-rate sensitive” stocks hurt performance, namely Charter Hall Retail (-3%), Dalrymple Bay (-3%) and Dexus Industrial (-5%).
As expected, there was no new income declared in either HNW Portfolio over January, though this will change in February.
Full reports to follow shortly.
