Neptune's Wintle doubles financial exposure

Neptune's head of US equities Felix Wintle has doubled the financials exposure in his £667m US Opportunities fund and is preparing to take his long-term underweight to the sector to neutral.

The manager has taken his weighting in financial stocks from 6.5% to 13%, although this is still a 3.5% underweight to the benchmark, in the view a number of factors will support the sector this year. “This is quite a big move from where we were, and we will probably go neutral as and when the opportunity arises,” Wintle said. “We have bought Bank of America, banks PNC and Zions, and Discover Financial Services, and have added to our Citigroup holding.” PNC and Zions are smaller regional banks the manager said will “add spice” to the portfolio. He has also been looking at consumer ...