Thank you all for joining us this morning, for taking the time. As Hannah said, I'm Iain Evans, newly appointed Chief Executive Officer at Polar Capital.

Together with our CFO, Samir Ayub, we'll take you through the interim results for the six months to the end of September. Moving to the highlights, please Hannah, on page 2.

A bit of a volatile start actually to the period in equity markets, but a positive end to the period led to assets being up 25% over that period, a record high of £26.7 billion, despite outflows over the period. Those outflows, I'm pleased to report, were concentrated in the first quarter, and redemptions slowed materially in the second quarter.

We saw broad demand across a good number of our strategies and improving performance over the period. As you can see on the screen there, adjusted diluted total EPS of 21.9p, and we are maintaining the interim dividend at 14p, payable next January.

I'll start with business and strategy, talk briefly through performance and flows, and then I'll pass to Samir, who is going to talk to the financials. Turning to page 4, please, Hannah.

Continuity, priority, growth. The leadership transition has been completed now, over the summer, and after 21 years at Polar Capital, unsurprisingly, I have a deep understanding of our people, our clients, and our culture, which has enabled me to hit the ground running.

We've already put in a focused leadership structure, and that's primarily to speed faster decision-making and increase accountability. As you see on the slide there, the middle of the slide, the vision is a very straightforward one, which is to be the active fund manager of choice, known and recognized for our distinctive, high-conviction strategies.

We do that through a distinct culture, which empowers independent thinking and high performance. Our ambition is to deliver diversified growth, and that's through differentiation and focus.

We want to do that without diluting who we are. Moving to next page, please, Hannah.

Next slide, page 5. We are coming from a position of strength.

We start from a position of strength, we have a strong brand and reputation, we have a very strong culture and talent within the business, deep investment expertise and specialist products, and we have long-standing, trusted client partnerships. All of that is backed by a strong balance sheet, which gives us flexibility and optionality through the cycle.

Having stepped into the role, I think about two priorities here. One is to amplify our core strengths.

When we think about our core strengths, I think about that across three things. Firstly, the product.

From a product perspective, we need to scale our winners, take targeted action where improvement is needed through support, and then really focus and allocate our resources where we have capacity and a proven edge. In distribution, we're quite unique as a boutique in that we have an international footprint, and we look to grow in priority markets globally, deepen relationships where we're well-established, and defend our market share, which is important to get sort of scalable net inflows over time.

Then culture very briefly. We have a very special culture.

I'm incredibly proud of it, having worked for the firm for 21 years, and it's absolutely critical to me that we protect that culture. It's entrepreneurial, it's vibrant, it's collegiate, where people are empowered, trusted, and accountable, and it's absolutely imperative that we maintain that.

Then secondly, we will continue to diversify the business selectively. We can do that through adding complementary, differentiated investment teams.

We can add strategies and vehicles to existing teams. It's absolutely critical that we have a compelling investment case where we do that, and that there's clear client demand.

Over the page, briefly. Now, I think while we cannot afford to be complacent, we are well placed for the cycle ahead.

As I've said already, we have those differentiated, specialist strategies. We have a boutique advantage.

We are specialist, entrepreneurial. We can make fast decisions, which enables us to be agile.

We don't have to be a first mover, but we can be a fast follower. We have strong distribution footprint, particularly strong in the UK and Europe.

Again, we're quite unique as a boutique in that nearly 40% of our total assets are from international clients, and we can continue to build on that. We have a strong base in the UK and Europe.

I see a step-change opportunity in the US, and we can build on our foothold in Asia. The digitization of the business means that we can extend our reach very efficiently and actually compete with the larger groups.

It levels the playing field. I've already mentioned culture and talent.

It's very strong, enables us to hire and retain high-conviction teams. Then brand strength.

We do have a very strong, trusted specialist brand, and that is recognized and valued by clients. Turning briefly to performance on slide 8.

You can see here the performance of our UCITS product, which represents 3/4 of our total AUM. As you can see, relative to their respective Lipper peer groups over 1 and 3 years, 2/3 of our funds are in the top two quartiles.

Over 5 years, that rises to 85% of total funds, and then since inception, 100% of our funds in the top two quartiles. I'm pleased to report, going on to side 9, please, Hannah, we saw a strong rebound over the 6 month reporting period.

That was led by technology and their high-conviction AI exposure. Healthcare and biotechnology also bounced back strongly after a softer Q1, and we saw strong performance from our smart energy team.

Not all areas performed as strongly, though. With the exception of Japan, which was a strong performer, our single-country and regional funds are behind benchmark year-to-date.

Our priority remains across all teams to deliver outperformance through the cycle, targeted support and fixes where needed. What has that meant for flows over the period?

If we take on slide 11, please, Hannah, a quick step back, it's worth highlighting, as I'm sure many of you are aware, that it continues to be a tough environment for active fund managers, particularly active equity. As you can see in that chart on the top left, active equity globally has been in net outflow for 7 of the last 8 years, 2021 being the only exception, and 2025 looks to be tracking in a similar way.

In that context, Polar Capital has been relatively resilient, as you can see, and pleasingly, the run rate has been improving since 2023. With dispersion and volatility picking up in markets, which has historically benefited active high-conviction strategies, we hope that the backdrop is improving.

Turning the page, or next slide. AUM, as I mentioned at the outset in highlights, all-time high of £26.7 billion at the end of the period, and with investment performance and strong markets, particularly in tech, we have had that technology tailwind.

That's continued to rise since, you can see there just over £28 billion as at the 7th of November. Average AUM, which Samir will talk about, was up 4% over the period.

It's worth noting that following the Liberation Day announcements back in April, and the sell-off in equities, we did see AUM trough at £19.9 billion during the period. Samir will cover that in more detail.

In terms of flows, on to the next slide, for the 6 month period, we have recorded net outflows of £690 million, with the addition of a £280 million one-off return of capital following an investment trust corporate action, which was related to our financials, Global Financials Trust. The outflows were concentrated in healthcare, European and UK equity, which remained out of favor with investors, and then we also had outflows in emerging markets, which was driven largely by a separately managed account from a overseas investor closing.

The run rate, though, improved significantly through the period, the net outflows in Q1 was £632 million and fell to £58 million in the second quarter. That's an encouraging, positive trend.

I should highlight that visibility remains limited. With volatility that we see, redemptions are too volatile and concentrated in nature.

Turning briefly to gross and net flows, what you can see on this slide is that, as I mentioned at the beginning, we've seen broad demand across our strategies, particularly strong in technology, healthcare, insurance, and Emerging Market Stars. That strong gross interest has been muted by net outflows.

Pleasingly, in the US, our International Small Company fund, which we launched just over a year ago, has continued to see net inflow, and that's really on renewed US appetite for international equities, something that we've not seen, probably for a decade. In the UK, and UK equities specifically, sentiment does appear to be improving, but caution is definitely persisting ahead of the November budget, and we've seen that in I don't know if you may have seen the data, record outflows in October in the UK.

In the current quarter, flows are marginally negative, but we are seeing a rising level of investor interest, and strengthening pipeline for potential inflows. Our focus simply is on turning that gross interest, which you see on the chart there, into durable net inflows.

With that, I'll pass over to Samir to take you through the financials.

Thank you, Iain, and good morning, everyone. Usual set of slides covering our financial review for those of us that have followed us for a while, and I'll spend a bit of time just explaining the P&L for anyone that is new to Polar.

Average AUM of the 6 month period, as Iain explained, up 4%, but underneath that, it's really been a story of two halves, really. Tariff-induced volatility in the market over Q1 meant that average AUM was £21.9 billion, below both the second half of the last financial year, but also the first half of the comparative interim period.

Really starting from a low base, and then the rebound in markets, but also good relative performance for our underlying funds, meant that we ended up with a Q2 average AUM of £25 billion. That's very important, because that's the average AUM that we're carrying into the second half of the financial year.

That explains some of the journey underneath that, overall average AUM for the 6 month period, up 4%, as I explained. Net management fee revenue was relatively flat at £86-odd million, and the reason for that was, net management fee yield coming in at 75 basis points at the end of the 6 months ended September.

That was for exactly the reasons that we'd flagged at the start of the financial year. It was entirely anticipated, and we had signaled that we expected to do at least the 2 basis points that we've signaled to be the long-term run rate for fee compression.

The reasons that we signaled was that we had renegotiated the fees on Polar Capital Technology Trust, which is a £6 billion closed-ended vehicle. That comprises a good 50% of that 3 basis points margin contraction.

The other dynamic that played out over the first half of this calendar year really was a sharp weakness in US dollar, which has fed through to the top revenue line. Obviously, there is ongoing underlying product mix changes, as we've signaled for a while.

What does that mean for the fee yield over the full financial year through to March '26? We expect that to be 75 basis points, this isn't an acceleration.

Over the medium to long term, we expect the fee margin contraction to continue at the 1 to 2 basis points that we've signaled for a while now. For the full year, we're expecting 75 basis points to be the number.

Now, as I've explained before, there are three key lines of profitability to the business. Core operating profit is net management fee revenue, less all direct costs, and that core operating profit number was roughly £25 million for the first 6 months of the year, down 8% period-on-period.

I'll spend a bit of time explaining why, but really two key factors. One is the fee yield compression that I just talked to, and the other is doing a little bit more on operating costs, which I'll cover when we get to the cost slide.

Core operating profit margin, 29% for the first half. As average AUM increases over the second half of the year and rises for the full financial year, all else being equal, we expect core operating profit margin for the full year to be around 30%, 31%, climbing back to where it was last year.

The other key line of profitability that we have for the business is, a number of our underlying funds do carry performance fees. We have a line that is performance fee profits, which is performance fee-related revenues minus staff interests.

It is not unusual for that line to be nil at the end of the interim period, because all of the performance fees crystallize at the end of December each year. Therefore, performance fee profits are a line and revenue that is effectively earned over the second half of each financial year.

We signaled in early October with our Q2 release that performance fee profits in our underlying funds were tracking at roughly £15 million, and where we stand today, that number still holds. We've done a little bit more through October and lost a little bit in early November, but the £15 million that we signaled at the start of October is still the number currently accrued.

Obviously, performance fees are not crystallized until the end of December. With just over a month and a bit to go, the final figure for that line will be released early January '26 when we come out with our Q3 release.

The final line on profitability is other income, and that includes a component of bank interest income, which is fairly flat year-on-year. The bigger component is marked-to-market gains, and losses sometimes, on our seed portfolio, net of hedging costs, and that's where we've done £4-odd million through the first 6 months of this financial year.

No exceptional items this year. Looking at the chart on the right-hand side, that is the spike under the exceptional items, because when you compare period-on-period movements in profitability, there was £6 million of impairment-related writedowns last year, no exceptional items this year, hence the slight spike year-on-year.

Putting everything together, adjusted diluted total EPS of 21.9p, and the dividend, as Iain explained, the board has maintained the first interim dividend at 14p, reflecting the confidence in the business and the strength of the balance sheet. Moving on to the next slide, we'll take a look at the cost base in slightly more detail.

As we've explained before, we try and manage the cost base over the long term and try and manage it sensibly. Starting with total operating and finance costs, they were down period-on-period 6%.

A big component of that decrease was the fact that we had exceptional items last year, the impairment charges that I referred to. No exceptional items this year, hence that 6% decrease.

Excluding exceptional items, total operating costs increased 3% period-on-period. Unpacking that increase, looking at the biggest component of our costs, staff compensation costs, we are a people business ultimately.

Staff costs increased roughly 2% period-on-period, not a large increase given the fact that actually the current 6 month period includes the full cost of the International Small Company team that arrived over the second half of last year. Those comparative numbers are not in the comparative period there.

We're obviously also carrying higher NIC costs given the changes announced recently. In effect, 2% increase period-on-period is a fairly well-managed increase to the overall compensation line, we feel.

The bit that we have done slightly more is other operating costs, and that I will come on to on the next slide, Hannah, if you move on to the next slide, please. Around these other non-compensation operating costs, and again, these are fairly tightly controlled over the long term, £1 million increase period-on-period, not significant, given the overall mix of costs.

A third of that £1 million reflects the increase across professional fees, as stated on that slide there, and that's effectively just giving a bit of focus on the risk management framework of the business as it matures and increases, and reflects an outsource move to internal audit services there. Then for the remainder of the increase, 50% of that reflects continued investment in digital content and US marketing, which are really key in terms of growing the business over the short to medium term.

Therefore, really important to continue investing in that. That covers the P&L, and then moving on, we take a quick look at the balance sheet over the next two slides, please, Hannah.

Cash and seed investments roughly £121 million combined. We do have a strategic seeding program, as I flagged before, which is really the R&D side of the business, and we were supporting eight funds.

As I flagged before, we do look to protect shareholders' funds in the seed portfolio by looking to hedge market risk wherever possible. Eight funds seeded and maintained at the end of that first interim period.

The next slide shows a different view of that balance sheet strength, and it sort of looks at our regulatory capital requirement. Hannah, if you please move on to the next slide for me.

We take a look on that slide at regulatory capital, which is static period-on-period, and the surplus capital £74 million over that regulatory requirement of £26 million, a healthy and comfortable position to be in. The framework for our use of capital, as I've explained before, four key components to our thinking.

We will continue to seed new product ideas, both as extension ideas of existing teams, and whenever we look to take on new teams and launch new products for them, that R&D side of the business will continue to absorb some capital as needed. We will continue to return funds to shareholders through our ordinary dividends.

We will continue to maintain some of that balance sheet strength for difficult market cycles, and to underpin confidence in the business. We will continue to look opportunistically using the EBT to dampen the dilutive impact of share incentive plans by buying into the EBT as and when.

The mix of those four key areas of use of capital will change over time, as the business grows and continues to mature. We will look at other avenues of either returning capital or using that surplus as and when needed.

That probably takes me on to that final piece, Hannah, moving on to that final slide. In terms of talking about the dividends, that slide really captures what's come before, but to signal that the first interim dividend announced of 14p at the half-year mark represents a payout ratio of 77% of adjusted core earnings.

Effectively, as we look out to the end of the full financial year, really we know that we have a good contribution coming hopefully from performance fee profits. Those crystallize at the end of December, as I say.

We will know the final quantum in early January, and therefore, we expect to be in a position where earnings for this financial year are covered, and provide cover over that dividend. That is the first order of priority as we think about dividends going forwards.

Achieve and maintain good line of visibility of earnings cover, and then look at other avenues of enhancing returns to shareholders by looking at that balance sheet strength and seeing if we need to add anything to the mix. In terms of summarizing the financial position really, higher average AUM of £25 billion as a starting point, as Iain flagged, absolute AUM of roughly £28 billion, early November going into that second half of the year provides a good underpin to core earnings, good contribution coming through from performance fees hopefully, over the second half of the financial year, and that strong balance sheet really gives us confidence and security to ride through market cycles.

The financials of the business are in a good place and set us up nicely to think about the outlook and carry on that conversation with Iain.

Thank you, Samir. In terms of outlook, moving to slide 23, please, Hannah.

I thought I'd talk about three of our key strategies where we've seen a resurgence in outperformance over the reporting period, and rising investor interest and demand, early inflows. Firstly, Global Technology.

As you can see on the chart here, as at the end of September, the fund has returned 42.2%, well ahead of its benchmark, and that momentum has continued since the end of the reporting period. That team is now currently almost 25% ahead of benchmark.

That's really been based on them maintaining a very high-conviction AI-centric stance in the portfolio. I believe we're at the end of the beginning of a multi-year cycle.

Leadership is broadening beyond the Mag 7, as you would have seen, we strongly believe that now is when you need a more selective, active approach in the technology space. We acknowledge that there are pockets of exuberance, and investor views are bifurcating.

We see that daily almost in the press. We don't see classic bubble signs.

We do expect volatility, and we do expect drawdowns, but overall, we remain very constructive, and we're focused on earnings and cash flow-backed winners in that sector. Similarly in healthcare, go back to the next slide.

Thank you, Hannah. There've been several overhangs that have weighed on the sector since November of last year.

In our view, Robert, drug pricing has been largely cleared now, and there's tangible progress on drug pricing. After a sharp drop in sentiment, investors are reassessing valuations and fundamentals.

As I said, we are seeing rising interest and early inflows. We've gone away from a position of net outflows during the reporting period to net inflows in the current quarter, which augurs well.

Thirdly, moving on to Smart Energy, having been, I think, in the barren for some months, 12 months, interest in alternative energy is returning as AI systems scale and energy requirements rise dramatically. I think with hyperscaler CapEx high and on-site power adoption rising, we see a multi-year power infrastructure cycle.

The team has performed strongly this year, as you can see on the chart, up 34% year-to-date. Just as a reminder, the team joined us in September 2021, 4 years ago, from Robeco.

Highly experienced team led by Thiemo Lang, and he is one of the most experienced investors in the sector. We're very constructive on the fundamentals theme and optimistic about the long-term potential within that portfolio.

Going on to the final slide, please, Hannah, just to summarize, the leadership transition has completed seamlessly. I'm delighted to be in the position as CEO and to deliver a solid set of results.

We closed the half, as Samir said, with record AUM of £26.7 billion AUM, and that's continued to rise. We're maintaining the dividend at 14p.

As that active interest in active management returns, we are seeing that rising level of engagement and a strengthening pipeline for potential inflows. In the near term, though, I should re-emphasize that we do have low visibility on potential outflows, and that's a headwind faced by the entire industry.

Our plan is very clear. We're going to scale where we're strongest, apply targeted fixes where needed, and diversify selectively, and leverage our distribution.

The environment is unpredictable, but our focus should be and remains on converting those healthy gross demand for our funds across the piece into durable net inflows. I think we're well positioned to scale through differentiation and to deliver long-term value for both our clients and for our shareholders.

With that, thank you very much for joining us. Thank you for your time, and happy to take any questions.

Thank you both for that helpful presentation.

Yes, over to Q&A. [clears throat] How safe is the dividend in the next few years?

A good question, and I suppose I will answer that by saying we are just coming out of a period of the last 2 years where the dividend was uncovered, but marginally so, uncovered by roughly 2p each of the last two financial years. Most of you will have heard me say before, as an indication, every 1p of dividend that is declared and paid is roughly £1 million of cash outlay, so that gives you some sort of sense of balance sheet strength and what we would need to do if we were to look to maintain the dividend at any point in time.

Ultimately, we recognize that the dividend is an important source of returns for a number of our shareholders. That dividend is very, very important.

In summary, it's foremost on our minds, whenever the board sits down and think about the dividend payout for any given financial year. That is why having that balance sheet strength is handy, during tough periods, where we can look to use to support it, and we've shown the ability and the intention to use that balance sheet to support the dividend if needed, as long as the numbers work.

That provides comfort that actually, we have the ability to do it, we have the intention, and we have the history to do it as long as we can manage it sensibly. Sorry, Hannah, I...

Thank you. Can you elaborate on the low visibility for outflows, and why that's a headwind for the entire industry?

I think going back to that chart, Hannah, where we showed outflows, particularly in active equity for 7 of the last 8 years, that's been a significant headwind, and I think that looks to be tracking in a very similar way this year, those headwinds don't seem to have abated. I think it's that combined with a greater macro uncertainty, you can't have that visibility on flows, or potential redemptions.

I do think we're in a strong position, because we are a niche provider, we have differentiated thematic strategies, we're seeing that demand coming back slowly. Where the greatest pressures are in, I think, regional strategies, where we're competing much more strongly with cheaper passive alternatives.

In terms of building long-term, robust net flows, we have to deliver on performance.

Okay. Are you seeing a drop in interest in the AI portfolio with recent strong contrarian views?

Great question. It's bifurcated.

I mentioned the outflows being more acute in the UK. I think that's symptomatic of budget uncertainty.

We have, as clients may know, we have two core flagship funds in our technology team. One is an open-ended UCITS, and the other is a closed-ended investment trust.

They're a similar size. The investment trust faces the UK market.

The open-ended fund, we sell globally. Interestingly, the open-ended fund has gone from net outflow in Q1 of the reporting period to net inflow in Q2.

That demand has been coming from European and Asian clients. Interestingly, we have been consistently buying back stock in the investment trust, which I think is reflective of the greater caution amongst UK investors.

We've been very clear with all of our existing clients and prospective clients saying we are constructive. We don't see classic signs of a bubble.

Yes, expect volatility, but we think this is the beginning of a multi-year AI cycle. We acknowledge that views are bifurcating at this point.

They certainly are. Perhaps picking up on that point you made there around more outflows in the UK, and you've said repeatedly in your statement about the opportunity that you see ahead in the US.

Yes. Can you talk a little bit more about how you're going to evolve your distribution strategy?

How meaningful is a step-change in the US?

Firstly, thank you, Hannah. If you If we look at our current international client exposure, as I said at the beginning, it's close to 40%.

Now, 30% of that is continental European investors, about 6% is Asian, and only just shy of 2%, is represented by US investors currently. It's the largest market globally, by a magnitude.

The opportunity is is very clear. The challenge for us, and we've been building our distribution team there for 5 years now, we have a a a specialist, highly experienced team of five.

The challenge has been the product that we've been selling into the US, International Small Company, Global Emerging Markets, up until very recently, the demand for overseas equity has been very muted. Investors, US investors have been very focused on their domestic market, equity market, and why wouldn't they be?

The returns have been so strong relative to the rest of the world. I think with change of policy in the US, weakening dollar, US investors are finally looking beyond their own shores, and that plays to the product set that we are selling into that market.

So, I'll give you one one anecdote. I was at a conference in the US in March 2024, and they asked they polled the investor audience, "What percentage of or where are you going to be putting client money from equity perspective in the next 12 months?"

Close to 100% was US equity. Same conference in March this year, pretty much the same audience, same poll, 52% international equity.

A real change in sentiment. We've not yet seen that sentiment turn into net fund flows, but the engagement is rising, which is which is very encouraging.

Brilliant, thank you. What is your exposure to crypto-focused shares, directly or indirectly?

Minimal, yes. Very minimal, Hannah.

Yes.

Thank you. Are there any trends in the commissions and fees payable that you can share with us?

Did you hear that, Hannah? Any trends on the fee tables?

Commissions and fees that you are currently paying.

I assume that's a reference to the line on the P&L. The relationship as a percentage of those commissions and fees payable, which effectively rebates in old money, are consistent with the revenue line period-on-period.

The important number to look at and flag is, what is the net management fee yield, which is the 75 basis points for the 6 months, and as I sort of said during the presentation, we expect that to be the number for the full financial year ending March '26, and going forwards, we expect the contraction to be no more than 1 to 2 basis points if we execute well and manage things well over the medium term. Obviously, there will be periods such as the one that we've just seen where we do a little bit more, but equally, there might be periods where actually that compression is lower because of the product mix changes.

Okay. Continuing on that theme, after you removed performance fees from the UK Value Opportunities funds, are you committed to maintaining performance fees on other strategies?

I think that the UK was quite specific. We have to acknowledge specific market pressures, and they've been particularly acute in the UK and in UK equity.

We want to maintain competitiveness for existing clients as well as prospective new clients. That was behind the decision to remove that from the UK Value fund.

Where we have highly specialist strategies that are genuinely capacity-constrained, we've all maintained those performance fees.

Thank you. You've touched on the US and the opportunities there, but you also mention Asia in your statement.

Can you talk a little bit more about which strategies clients are looking at in that region?

The demand we've seen in Asia actually is for growth strategies, and for thematic specifically. We've had presence on the ground in Asia now since the end of 2022.

Yeah. Initially, client base there was our global client base, it was the global financial institutions that you'd be familiar with, the UBSs and J.P.

Morgans. That business has built over time to encompass and include some of the regional banks, specifically in Singapore and Hong Kong.

The demand we see is just very aligned with our product set, which has enabled us to grow sort of up to 7% of 6, 7% of our assets now from that region.

Thank you. Share buybacks, obviously it's a successful strategy utilized by your investment trusts when trading at a discount.

At what point does Polar consider it in preference to dividends?

We are very much of the view that actually Uh, when we look at what's happening in the UK landscape, they they are becoming more of a feature in terms of returns to shareholders, and actually, there's absolutely a place for them. As I said, a few moments ago, I think for us, though, coming out of 2 years of a slightly, albeit slightly, uncovered dividend, which we felt we've sort of managed the situation well, as a board, the first order of priority is build earnings cover back on the dividend, and then, as this year, we expect to have slightly more cash flow from, say, performance fees, that will crystallize at the end of December.

Then we can take stock and say, is there something interesting that we can do and add, a buyback component, and how meaningful can we make that, and what are the right parameters? Because ultimately, you need to make sure that you are delivering value for shareholders.

Every price point isn't the right price point, but, arguably, the shares are undervalued at this moment in time. I think there is a place for them, but the first priority is build earnings cover back in and then look to see whether we we can, introduce buybacks in a sensible fashion.

Thank you. A follow-up on redemptions, I think.

Is there an opportunity to move more of your AUM into investment trusts, protecting you from UCITS net redemption risk?

That's a very good question, Hannah. It's not mine.

[chuckles] Well, many people are aware, that the investment trust sector has been under increasing scrutiny and pressure in the last 12, 18 months with the likes of Saba and other activist investors coming in. I think it's definitely focused the sector.

It's focused the minds of boards. We've seen the number of investment trusts drop in the last 12 months.

We remain very much committed to the sector. Yes, I think we can grow.

Three things, I think, you need in the investment trust sector: you need a relevant investment strategy mandate; you need performance, always; and you need scale. If I look at our Technology Trust, that's nearly £6 billion sterling AUM, FTSE 100 company, it has all three of those things.

Our two other investment trusts in healthcare and financials have two out of the three, because arguably, we would like them to be bigger, over £500 million as minimum. We're actively looking where we can, if there are opportunities to scale those, whether it's through share issuance or looking at other peer groups that we could potentially merge with.

There's been a recent corporate action for the BBH Healthcare Trust. We participated in that pitch.

We weren't successful on this occasion, but we're very open to those opportunities, and we'll pursue those opportunities where they're appropriate.

Okay. Then another follow-up.

How does the net fee yield on investment trusts compare to open-ended? Then obviously, how that impacts your appetite to pursue both.

Of course. Remember again that by far, as Ian explained, the largest trust is our Technology Trust, the fee yield quite simply on the trust combined is bang in line with effectively our overall fee margin, they're not too dissimilar.

Thank you. Do you have investment in any military equipment, particularly drones or anti-drone defense companies, and if so, which strategies would they occur in?

No overt sort of sub-strategies within our product range, and again, the thinking on defense spending has changed over the last recent years. Not that long ago, again, defense spending was not really very, very acceptable.

Again, there is some indirect linkage. They are not close to the details on the underlying tech portfolio, but there may be some exposure there.

It is not significant enough to pop up on the largest holdings, etc. It is not an overt sleeve of the overall tech view.

Thank you. Circling back on to AI, seems that bifurcation of views that you mentioned, are there other opportunities for additional, more focused strategies within tech?

I think, Hannah, we would always look at those. I think thematic investing is here to stay.

The demand is clearly there. Demand for underlying themes is cyclical.

I think the more specialist you go, the more cyclical that demand can become. When we think about what we could do, extension strategies in tech, what is that cyclicality?

What is the demand? Going back to my earlier point, it's critical that there's a strong investment case.

What we don't want to do is to launch a strategy because we're top of a cycle and we can raise $1 billion. We want to launch strategies because we genuinely believe there's an investment case and that we can make investors money.

One which I think we are talking about, is cybersecurity. It's front and center of everyone's mind, every business's mind.

It's probably the number one risk. Beyond that, I think it very much is driven by the investment case.

Thank you. Given the demand for and performance of Polar's Asian growth strategies, is this a sector that could potentially tick the three boxes for an investment trust strategy?

Potentially, yes, I think. The challenge with investment trusts, I'm not sure I could even name a successful IPO in recent times, and what you need to be sure again is is there sufficient investor demand, because I don't think we wouldn't want to launch a new investment trust with less than £500 million sterling, because you need that liquidity, particularly for the private wealth channel, the consolidation there, the growth there.

Unless you are confident that you can raise at least that in capital, I don't think it's something we'd want to do.

That is it from questions from our audience today. That just leaves me to say thank you to them for attending, thank you to you both for your time and presenting today

for

the rest of the roadshow, and we look forward to hearing an update in 6 months' time.

Thank you, Hannah. Thank you.

Thank you to everyone for your continued support and questions. Yes, thank you.