Ruffer: The challenge of coping with 'manic depressive' markets

Two key factors

Hamish Baillie and Steve Russell, managers of the Ruffer Investment Company, have addressed the difficulty of positioning the portfolio to cope with the "manic depressive nature" of current markets.

In their latest monthly investment commentary, the duo said despite seeing their trust outperform the FTSE All-Share Total Return index last month, current markets "could not honestly be described as healthy". The trust's NAV rose by 2.3% in March, ahead of the index which returned 1.9% during the same period, but after the volatility seen at the start of the year, the pair "bi-polar would be a more apposite characterisation" of the current market conditions. Baillie and Russell (pictured) said: "This manic depressive nature of financial markets is to our minds symbolic of two feature...