Fidelity's Morse slashes exposure to European dividend cutters

Trust hit with 20% cut in payouts

Sam Morse reduced exposure to companies forced into cutting their dividends due to the coronavirus crisis as his Fidelity European Values Trust (FEV) suffered a 20% cumulative cut in payouts.

Morse told Investment Week the majority of the £1.1bn trust's holdings had weathered the Covid-19 pandemic well, leading to outperformance in the year to date. FEV is up 6.3% to 9 October compared to its FTSE World Europe ex UK benchmark's return of 2.3% and its IT Europe ex UK sector peers' average 4.9% gain, according to FE fundinfo. The manager said there had been a variety of reasons holdings cut their payouts, with some forced by regulators and politicians while others had more fundamental issues. Multi-manager funds up equity allocations as European funds find favour in Q2 20...