My internship with Berry & Oak
As an MA Business and Marketing undergraduate at the University of Edinburgh, I was keen to gain some … Read more >
Our Investment Approach
When you start talking about investments, everyone seems to think it's all about what return you can get. While this is important, it's often more about managing risk and deciding on the best option to safeguard your wealth.
Once we understand your goals and aspirations, we’ll research the whole market to find the investment solutions that are best for you, then negotiate rates and carry out due diligence to ensure everything fits in with your long-term goals.
We’ll then design a portfolio that’s intelligent, personal and perfect for your needs, ensuring you’re kept in the loop about how everything is performing, as the months and years go by.
At every step of the way, we remind ourselves that being in control of your money and your future happiness is a very big responsibility – and one we take very seriously.
To underpin our investment philosophy, we’ve created these six rules for investing. These rules help keep the investment process, and more importantly clients, in the right assets at the right time and keeps the investment team on the right tracks. They have helped us steer clear of investing in some asset classes at the wrong time and also from investing in things that were too good to be true.
Our investment philosophy
- We’re in it for the long-term
We believe our clients reap the greatest rewards by taking a long-term view and being prepared to sit out market price changes. So we only invest our client’s money for the medium to long-term, advising them to keep funds in cash or cash accounts to fund their short-term objectives.
- Variety is the spice of life
We believe a broad, diversified portfolio works best and this is what we aim to offer all of our clients, ensuring we take their attitude to risk into account. Each client will receive their own tailored investment solution – but our process for portfolio creation always remains consistent.
- It’s all about strategy and planning
According to academic research, asset allocation is the biggest influence when it comes to the returns of a portfolio, and that’s something we agree with. That’s why we create portfolios that invest in different types of holdings to strike the right balance – something we believe is one of the most important parts of the financial planning process.
- Keeping on top of risk
No matter how money is invested, we review our clients’ investments at least once a year. They’re also regularly rebalanced to ensure the asset allocation and level of risk is still appropriate – and that means the least amount of risk to achieve each client’s objectives and goals.
- Many happy returns
While investment returns are beyond our control, we can influence the amount of risk taken and search out funds that are delivering stronger returns. Our diligent approach to risk over the years has meant we’ve been able to add real value to our clients’ portfolios.
- Our commitment is guaranteed
Unfortunately, market returns are not guaranteed and the value of any investment can go down as well as up. However, our financial planning process takes into account the impact of all potential returns, putting our clients in the best position possible to achieve their investment and life goals.
