BlackRock Sustainable American Income Trust Plc - Portfolio Update
PR Newswire
London, August 19
The information contained in this release was correct as at 31 July 2021. Information on the Company's up to date net asset values can be found on the London Stock Exchange Website at:
https://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/market-news/market-news-home.html.
BLACKROCK SUSTAINABLE AMERICAN INCOME TRUST PLC (LEI:549300WWOCXSC241W468)
All information is at31 July 2021 and unaudited.
Performance at month end with net income reinvested
| One Month | Three Months | Six Months | One Year | Three Years | Five Years | |
| Net asset value | -1.0% | -0.8% | 14.7% | 25.9% | 23.8% | 60.9% |
| Share price | -0.5% | -6.4% | 14.6% | 23.1% | 21.9% | 63.0% |
| Russell 1000 Value Index | 0.2% | 1.5% | 17.6% | 31.5% | 30.0% | 63.9% |
At month end
| Net asset value - capital only: | 194.08p |
| Net asset value - cum income: | 194.48p |
| Share price: | 183.50p |
| Discount to cum income NAV: | 5.6% |
| Net yield1: | 4.4% |
| Total assets including current year revenue: | £156.0m |
| Gearing: | Nil |
| Ordinary shares in issue2: | 80,229,044 |
| Ongoing charges3: | 1.1% |
1 Based on four quarterly interim dividends of 2.00p per share declared on 4 November 2020 for the year ended 31 October 2020, and on 23 March 2021, 5 May 2021 and 5 August 2021 for the year ending 31 October 2021, and based on the share price as at close of business on 31 July 2021.
² Excluding 20,132,261 ordinary shares held in treasury.
³ Ongoing charges represent the management fee and all other operating expenses excluding interest as a % of average shareholders' funds for the year ended 31 October 2020.
| Sector Analysis | Total Assets (%) |
| Financials | 23.4 |
| Health Care | 16.9 |
| Information Technology | 15.2 |
| Consumer Discretionary | 10.4 |
| Communication Services | 7.2 |
| Industrials | 6.2 |
| Utilities | 5.7 |
| Consumer Staples | 5.4 |
| Materials | 4.5 |
| Energy | 3.9 |
| Real Estate | 0.9 |
| Net Current Assets | 0.3 |
| ---- | |
| 100.0 | |
| ===== | |
| Country Analysis | Total Assets (%) |
| United States | 74.0 |
| Canada | 5.4 |
| France | 5.2 |
| Japan | 4.6 |
| United Kingdom | 3.4 |
| Australia | 2.4 |
| Switzerland | 2.1 |
| Norway | 1.5 |
| Denmark | 1.1 |
| Net Current Assets | 0.3 |
| ----- | |
| 100.0 | |
| ===== | |
| Top 10 Holdings | Country | % Total Assets |
| Woodside Petroleum | Australia | 5.0 |
| Cisco Systems | United States | 4.7 |
| Zimmer Biomet | United States | 3.5 |
| AstraZeneca | United Kingdom | 3.4 |
| Danone | France | 3.3 |
| Cognizant Technology Solutions | United States | 3.2 |
| Komatsu | Japan | 3.1 |
| Wells Fargo | United States | 3.1 |
| Comerica | United States | 2.9 |
| General Motors | United States | 2.9 |
Tony DeSpirito, David Zhao and Lisa Yang, representing the Investment Manager, noted:
For the one-month period ended 31 July 2021, the Company's NAV decreased by 1.0% and the share price by 0.5% (all in sterling). The Company's reference index, the Russell 1000 Value Index, returned +0.2% for the period.
The largest detractor from relative performance was stock selection in health care, as our selection decisions in the pharmaceuticals and health care equipment and supplies industries proved costly. In real estate, an underweight allocation to the equity real estate investment trusts (REITs) industry also weighed on relative returns. Other detractors during the period included stock selection in consumer discretionary and investment decisions in the financials sector.
The largest contributor to relative performance was security selection in the information technology (IT) sector. Specifically, selection decisions within IT services and software helped relative returns, as did an underweight allocation to the semiconductors and semiconductor equipment industry. In industrials, stock selection in aerospace and defence boosted relative results. Lastly, at the industry level, stock selection in food products and entertainment contributed to relative performance during the period.
Following shareholder approval of the new investment objective and policy at a General Meeting on 29 July the portfolio has been re-organised to reflect the new objective of investing in a manner consistent with the principles of sustainable investing. Additionally, the exposure to medium-cap companies has increased and the number of portfolio holdings reduced, and the latter currently stands at 53. As a consequence of these changes the Company has changed its name to BlackRock Sustainable American Income Trust plc. Further explanation of the recent changes is set out on the Company's website www.blackrock.com/uk/brsa.
Transactions
Notable new purchases in the portfolio include Comerica, Woodside Petroleum, PepsiCo and Ralph Lauren. The largest portfolio sales included exiting positions in Comcast, Unilever, BAE Systems and Medtronic.
Positioning
As of the period end, the Company's largest overweight positions relative to the benchmark were in the IT, consumer discretionary and financials sectors. The Company's largest underweight positions relative to the benchmark were in the industrials, real estate and consumer staples sectors.
Source: BlackRock. Data as of 31 July 2021.
19 August 2021
Latest information is available by typing blackrock.com/uk/brsa on the internet, "BLRKINDEX" on Reuters, "BLRK" on Bloomberg or "8800" on Topic 3 (ICV terminal). Neither the contents of the Manager's website nor the contents of any website accessible from hyperlinks on the Manager's website (or any other website) is incorporated into, or forms part of, this announcement.
