Temple Bar Investment Trust, the investment trust that focuses on intrinsic value and long-term growth by investing primarily in UK-listed securities, has today announced annual results for the year ended 31 December 2025.
The trust delivered a net asset value total return of 33.9% over the year, way ahead of its benchmark FTSE All-Share Index, which returned 24%. The share price total return was even stronger at 45.3%, helped by a sharp narrowing of the discount and a move into a premium.
Since Redwheel took over portfolio management at the end of October 2020, the total NAV total has returned 199.8% versus 103.7% for the benchmark. This is a highly commendable outperformance of 8.9 percentage points a year.
Lifting the lid on performance in what was a strong year for UK stocks, Temple Bar’s returns were driven primarily by stock selection rather than broader market movements, as demonstrated by the outperformance of the benchmark and driven by the portfolio manager’s focus on company fundamentals, valuation discipline, and active engagement with investee companies.
The trust noted that profits were taken in several strong performers during the year, notably in banks and insurance stocks, with the proceeds recycled into new positions including Johnson Matthey and Smith & Nephew.
According to Temple Bar’s latest fact sheet, top holdings as of 28 February were BT (5%), Shell (4.8%), BP (4.1%), Marks & Spencer (4.0%), and NatWest (3.9%).
Investors will be delighted to see the dividend rise 33.3% to 15 pence per share, representing a yield of 4% at the year-end. Those investors buying now will have a yield of around 4.1% after the recent bout of volatility.
Plans are to increase quarterly payments to 3.9 pence per share in 2026, taking the full-year total to 15.6 pence.
Of that total, 3 pence per share will be funded from capital reserves, a policy introduced to reflect the growing proportion of UK corporate distributions being returned through share buybacks rather than dividends.
In their commentary on recent performance, the trust acknowledged that UK equity valuations have risen but noted this was from a very low post-COVID starting point, and that UK-listed companies continue to trade at significant discounts to international peers. This underpins their strategy.
“The combination of strong performance, a rising dividend and increased marketing has led to significant demand for the Company’s shares, particularly from retail investment platforms such as interactive investor and Hargreaves Lansdown,” said Charles Cade, Chairman of Temple Bar Investment Trust.
“This has helped move the Company’s share price to a premium to Net Asset Value per share. I am pleased to report that as a result, the Company was able to re-issue 5,045,000 shares out of treasury during the year at an average premium of 3.0%, raising £18.6m. Since 31 December 2025 to 18 March 2026, further shares have been re-issued from treasury and as a result, the Company’s market capitalisation is £1.1bn at the time of writing, up from £776m at the start of 2025.
“In our last annual report, we highlighted that the Board monitors the Company’s investable universe to ensure that the Portfolio Manager has a large enough opportunity set to build a diversified portfolio of attractively valued investments. At present, the Portfolio Manager continues to believe that the opportunity set is large enough under the Company’s current investment restrictions. However, should the universe of UK listed companies continue to reduce materially, the Board may in the future propose a broadening of the investment policy to increase the ability of our Portfolio Manager to access overseas opportunities beyond the current 30% limit.”