Sign up to our newsletter

Philosophy

Our approach to investing in global equities is based on the firm belief that a portfolio of very high quality businesses will deliver above average returns over the medium to long term. With this in mind, we seek to identify superior companies with sustainable competitive advantages and an ability to consistently generate above average returns on capital.

Broadly speaking, we invest in companies based on their investment merit as determined by their prospects, quality and valuations.

Investment Approach

Ned Bell, CIO at Bell Asset Management discusses why Bell’s investment approach is focused on bottom -up stock selection with a Quality bias, what the key differentiators are across their fund strategies and the importance of a valuation discipline to identify disconnection between Quality and Value.

1

Quantitative

  • Filter for ROE > 15% over 3 consecutive years;
  • Market cap > $1bn MSCI Developed Markets Countries
  • ESG negative screens
2

Prioritization

  • Quality score applied
  • Measures profitability, growth and financial strength
  • Unbiased, disciplined, idea generation
3

Qualitative

Fundamental test:
pass or fail

  • Management
  • Franchise Strength
  • Profitability
  • Financial Strength
  • Business Drivers
  • ESG
4

Valuation

  • Identify mispriced stocks
  • Disconnection between quality & value
5

Portfolio Construction

  • Identifying optimal blend across the entire ‘Quality’ spectrum
  • No regional/ sector limits
  • Modest turnover
  • Target consistent outcomes
  • Resilient in falling markets
  • Attain strong batting average
  • Target higher portfolio ESG rating vs Index
  • Carbon intensity at least 25% below benchmark

Establish universe

Core ~ 900

Select    “

SMID ~ 700

Idea generation

~ 450

 “

~ 350

Quality test

~ 250

 “

~ 150

Holdings

90 ~ 100

30 ~ 50

35 ~ 55

Company quality will ultimately drive share prices over time, and as such we aim to identify leaders within their respective sectors. We define a ‘high quality company’ as one with an attractive combination of:

  • Quality Management
  • Consistent Profitability
  • Franchise Strength
  • Financial Strength
  • Favourable Business Drivers
  • Environmental, Social & Governance

We employ a “bottom-up” stock selection approach to investing in global equities. We consider the MSCI Developed and Emerging Markets as our starting universe and then methodically shrink our potential investment universe by applying strict quantitative criteria. Over time we have found that this approach has had the dual benefit of:

a) eliminating poor quality companies from investment consideration, and
b) focusing our research efforts on a smaller & higher quality universe of companies.

The investment team undertake extensive company research across the globe. Over the past 4 years, we have conducted over 1,500 company meetings. We have generated over 10,000 company research posts on our internal research database.

ESG Philosophy

Bell Asset Management (BAM) employs a robust and ongoing commitment towards integrating Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) issues within our investment process. We employ a disciplined investment framework combined with Stewardship and ESG specific activities including ESG screening, ESG analysis, active engagement and proxy voting with companies in all of our portfolios.

We believe that integrating ESG factors into our investment process will deliver superior long term returns to our clients. We believe that as stewards of our client’s capital, active ownership and engagement is in the best interests of our investors.

Documents below are available for download: