Judging kicks off for 2011 IT Awards

The judging process for the 13th annual Investment Trust of the Year Awards has begun, with the addition of a new judge and award categories.

In total there are 15 awards based on AIC sector groupings, as well as five additional categories and a group award.

This year, Best Private Client Research has been added, alongside awards such as Most Consistent Performer, Best New Issue, Best Shareholder Value and Outstanding Achievement.

Data from the AIC will be used to form a shortlist for Most Consistent Performer, which will look at trusts/companies with the highest number of positive total returns over the past decade.

The Private Client Research shortlist will be formed via nominations made by the trusts in each of the sector classifications.

Trusts or companies appear on the shortlists as a result of a quantitative screening, based on the award methodology examining three years of NAV returns to 31 July 2011.

The sector award categories have two new additions: the creation of an International Income category as well as a VCT category.

The AIC, using Morningstar and FE Analytics, is running through the data and the shortlist for each of the award categories is expected to be published in early September.

Trusts and their boards will then be invited to submit a questionnaire, which will be used by the judging panel to decide the winners in each respective category.

Deadline for submission of the questionnaires will be in early October, with the award ceremony on 23 November at the Grand Connaught Rooms in London.

Stephen Peters, investment trust analyst at Charles Stanley, has joined this year’s judging panel.

He sits alongside panelists Nick Greenwood, fund of investment trusts manager at Miton, and investment trust director James Carthew, Simon Elliott, head of investment trust research at Wins, and Bestinvest’s Simon Moore, senior investment trust analyst.

The panel is completed with Lawrence Gosling, editorial director at Incisive Media and Kira Nickerson, partner at Elite Investment Communications.

For more information on submissions please contact:

Alison Savage of Elite Investment Communications at Sav@theeic.co.uk .

For details on the awards process please contact:

Kira Nickerson at kira@theeic.co.uk or Lawrence Gosling at lawrence.gosling@incisivemedia.com.

For sponsorship details on the event contact:

Louise Hanna at louise.hanna@incisivemedia.com or 020 7316 9675 or Natasha Buckle at natasha.buckle@incisivemedia.com or 020 7316 9491.