The Fund rose 1.65% in March, ahead of its performance comparator of cash (as measured by the Bank of England’s Sterling Overnight Index Average (“SONIA”)) + 5%, which rose by 0.46%.

The war in Ukraine and the ongoing implications that this brought continued to weigh heavily on the UK stockmarket at the start of March. By the end of the first week the FTSE 100 Index was down over 6% from the start of the month, but started to recover from this point. As the extent of the sanctions imposed against Russia became clear, along with the solidarity shown by NATO and the western nations, markets began to return to their earlier levels, with the FTSE 100 Index finishing the month up 0.77%.

One strategy had an observation point in March – an eight year Note with CIBC as the counterparty taken out in March 2019. This strategy needed the FTSE 100 Index to be at or above 95% of its starting level on the observation date to mature with a gain. The Index was comfortably above this level triggering the maturity of the strategy after three years with a gain of 27.60%, from a rise of just 3.14% in the underlying Index.