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2023-10 Vermeer Partners - Brochure

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I

RMEE R E PARTNER S


THE ART OF

INVESTMENT

ABOUT US

At Vermeer Partners we do things differently because

we believe that our clients deserve more. More of

our focus, more of our commitment and more of our

passion for what we do.

We set up Vermeer Partners in 2018 because we

didn’t like how client focus was being eroded at larger

organisations in favour of profitability. We are a uniquely

independent and focused investment management

business.

Unlike other firms, we have no shareholders, no parent

company, we are 100% owned by our partners many of

whom are also our investment managers - the people

managing your money.

We ask clients to trust us to look after their money and

their future, and the only way to truly replicate that

trust is to be aligned. Our success relies on us getting it

right for our clients.

1



MANAGEMENT

TEAM

Simon Melling is our CEO and he has held Board level

roles since the early 1990s, most recently as CEO of

AIM listed stockbroker Cenkos.

“Our absolute focus at Vermeer Partners is on you,

the client. It really is as simple as that. Despite

this, it’s a fact which many larger organisations

increasingly seem to overlook. There may be a

business advantage to treating clients as a single

commodity, but we are not focused on economies

of scale, we are interested in serving and meeting

the needs of the individual – each and every one

of our clients. This personalised approach extends

to our investment philosophy which isn’t driven by

benchmarks but, given our collective passion for

stock picking, we all work to add real value and

insight to the process.

I am extremely proud to lead such a dedicated

team of professionals, all of whom are committed

to delivering an appropriate and truly personal

service to our client base.”

BESPOKE

PROACTIVE

TRUSTWORTHY

INNOVATIVE

ROBUST

PERSONAL

3



VERMEER PARTNERS

IT’S NOT JUST

WORDS

Vermeer Partners is a partnership of individuals

passionate about investing. We needed a place where,

through hard work and a love of what we do, we could

make the most of our experience.

Collectively, we wanted to continue to hone our

investment skills and approach, pass that onto our next

generation of investment managers, all with the goal

of achieving the best results for our clients now and for

their future.

BESPOKE PORTFOLIOS

We set up Vermeer Partners because we believed

investment solutions were becoming commoditised and

benchmark based.

We build bespoke investment strategies based on

research, our collective investment experience and a

passion for stock picking.

Individual investment managers have the flexibility and

discretion to tailor your portfolio to your requirements.

However, they do not operate in isolation, but inside

a core process that monitors their performance and

ensures that a consistent and high-quality service is

delivered.

This investment governance framework comes under

the supervision of our Chief Investment Officer and

Investment Committees.

OUR PHILOSOPHY

At the heart of our philosophy is a fundamental belief

that equities will deliver the most attractive, inflationadjusted

returns compared to other asset classes over

the long term. Moreover, we are passionate about

investing. We undertake research to identify the very

best companies around the world regardless of where

they are domiciled, rather than sticking only to the UK.

Our investment philosophy relies on diversification –

spreading risk across industries and regions – to offer

protection and growth to our clients’ portfolios. This is

particularly important in today’s unstable environment.

We recommend portfolios are invested on an

international basis to benefit from exposure to a range

of high quality, global companies.

Our investment managers have flexibility to design

a portfolio that will meet your specific needs. Sitting

behind that, is our investment process which provides

a robust governance framework incorporating risk

management, due diligence and regular peer review.

These checks and balances ensure your portfolio remains

in line with your investment objectives over time.

YOUR REQUIREMENTS

Our process is designed around what is important to

you. We ask our clients to share with us their personal

circumstances, their professional goals now and for the

future and together we discuss risk: how much you’re

comfortable with and what is appropriate for your

circumstances.

All these factors are combined to create an

investment strategy that meets your needs and

your aspirations. Of course financial priorities

and personal circumstances change over time.

We commit to our clients over the long term

and believe that regular communication

and review is a priority to enable us to

anticipate those changes and to adapt to

accommodate you.

We want you to make the most of us always

being available to listen and offer guidance,

and by actively managing your personal

portfolio we provide you with the comfort

of knowing you are our priority.

YOUR TEAM

We do not have client relationship

managers, your first point of contact is your

Investment Director. Only by developing a

personal relationship with you can we fully

understand your investment goals.

And we take personal service and attention to

detail even further. Each Investment Director is

supported by a team who have all worked together

for many years and you have direct access to every

person in your team. Whether you want to review your

portfolio, have a specific stock you want to discuss or

just need to reset your password, your entire team is at

your disposal.

We don’t want you to ever speak to someone you don’t

know, or who doesn’t know you.

THE ART OF

INVESTMENT

4 5



INVESTMENT PROCESS

First and foremost, we treat our clients as individuals

and the construction of their portfolios will always

take that into account. Our investment managers have

the flexibility and discretion to curate portfolios to

meet clients’ specific investment objectives. However,

they do not operate in isolation, but inside a core

process that monitors portfolio construction, risk, and

performance to ensure a consistent and high-quality

outcome. We feel that this approach is only possible

within an independent partnership with a high degree of

alignment between investment manager and client.

Our investment philosophy relies on active management

and diversification - across themes, regions and asset

classes - to offer protection and growth to our clients’

portfolios while managing risk.

We favour companies that are financially strong, have

dominant market positions and can generate rising levels

of cash-flow, which can be returned to shareholders on

a consistent basis. These global investments will form

the bedrock of all client portfolios and as such we expect

portfolio turnover to be low.

We concentrate our investment process on long-term

investment ideas designed to protect and grow clients’

wealth, combined with bottom-up research into the

companies we invest in. We avoid making frequent

or major allocation calls, preferring a bottom-up or

thematic approach; but where our views change, we

are not hesitant in taking action. We consider all our

investments from a global perspective, continually

seeking out the very best companies and fund managers.

“In terms of our investment process we always seek

out suitable opportunities on a global basis. Not

only will this enable us to achieve a diversity of risk

and exposures but more importantly we believe will

lead to longer term outperformance. Put simply, in

the modern global economy in which we operate we

need to find the very best companies regardless of

where they are domiciled.

We are not restricted by benchmarks and are

looking for companies which have exceptional

franchises, are financially strong and have the ability

to generate rising levels of cash-flow. This can then

be invested in their businesses and returned to

shareholders.” Simon King, Chief Investment Officer

We always look to invest via direct securities rather than

collective funds and this helps to keep transparency

higher and overall costs lower. Where we do not have

direct expertise in certain asset classes or equity sectors,

we use collective funds. We are genuinely openarchitecture

and can invest in funds, both large and

small, from all the major fund groups around the world.

This includes investment trusts as well as larger openended

funds. Our size allows us to consider investments

that preclude larger investment firms from investing and

we believe this provides us an investment advantage.

Our investment process is designed to ensure that

investment managers are empowered to curate the most

suitable investment portfolio to meet the needs of their

clients. Our process is a collegiate, pragmatic, thoughtful

framework developed by a team of highly experienced

investment professionals, many of whom have worked

together for a number of years.

AT THE HEART OF

OUR PHILOSOPHY IS

A DESIRE TO KEEP

THINGS SIMPLE

AND DEMONSTRATE

THAT TO GENERATE

HIGHER RETURNS

WE DO NOT NEED

TO TAKE ON

UNDUE RISK

7



PRIVATE CLIENTS

We pride ourselves on offering a bespoke portfolio

service and believe in treating you as an individual, so it

is rare for two portfolios to be identical.

We understand your needs will change over time and we

offer support through every step of that journey to:

– Work out your long-term objectives

– Provide you with reliable income

– Accommodate your future expenditure

– Preserve wealth for future generations

– Ensure you understand the potential risk and

reward in your portfolio.

We structure our investment teams to support you now

and for future generations.

PENSIONS

We are highly experienced in managing pension

investments particularly Self-Invested Personal Pensions

(SIPP), Qualifying Recognised Overseas Pension Schemes

(QROPS), Small Self-Administered Schemes (SSAS) and

other corporate pension schemes.

Our systems ensure that communication between all

associated parties functions seamlessly.

We have agreements in place with many third-party

pension providers and it is possible to add further new

relationships upon request.

ISAS

To reduce your overall tax liability* we encourage our

clients to run an ISA portfolio alongside their personal

portfolio. Your investment manager will run each

portfolio under a single strategy, which will be agreed

with you at the outset. Pooling these two investment

portfolios ensures your money is managed efficiently,

your personal allowances are maximised, and over

exposure to any one investment is avoided.

JUNIOR ISAS & BARE

TRUSTS

We provide a complete investment service to allow

our clients to have all the family portfolios managed in

one place by one team. As with all our services, your

investment portfolios are tailored to meet specific

requirements, whether it is to fund school fees, university

costs or first homes.

* Vermeer Partners do not provide tax advice and you will

need to seek advice from your independent tax adviser.

Not all clients may benefit from a separate ISA portfolio.

9



TRUSTS

We have a wide range of family trust clients, with whom

we work, which includes offshore trusts. Our investment

managers support both professional trustees and

members of the family to find the right approach to

meet their objectives in terms of growing their capital,

preserving their wealth and generating income.

Trustees can be confident of measuring our performance

against the benchmarks they set to achieve the trust’s

goals, because our reporting is always clear and to the

point.

Solicitors and accountants will also find us supportive

when seeking the documentation they require for

the filing of reports and accounts. Our portfolio

management services are also open - and would prove

highly beneficial - to family partnerships and other types

of corporate structure.

We know every trust has been set up to fulfil a purpose

and that the trusts come in different shapes and sizes.

Our experience in managing trust portfolios has been

accumulated over several decades and includes: Bare

Trusts, Discretionary Trusts, Will Trusts, Family Trusts

and Court of Protection Portfolios.

ADVISERS

We manage investment portfolios introduced by a

wide range of professional intermediaries including

financial advisers, solicitors and accountants. This often

includes probate work for solicitors; managing complex

tax wrappers such as offshore bonds or family OEICs

for clients of financial advisers; or managing court of

protection assets.

We focus exclusively on investments and do not offer

tax advice or financial planning services. We have many

years’ experience in the professional intermediary sector

and have developed strong and lasting relationships

with many of the leading financial adviser, solicitor and

accountancy practices both in the UK and in offshore

financial centres such as Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of

Man.

We always remember who introduces clients to us and

respect the boundaries between our professions to

avoid compromising each other’s client relationships.

We do not own any solicitor, accountancy or advisory

businesses, so there is no conflict of interest, nor danger

of losing referred business to in-house competitors.

We always remember whose client we are working for.

OUR INDEPENDENCE

IS ONE OF OUR KEY

STRENGTHS AND

THIS GIVES US THE

ABILITY TO REFER

OUR CLIENTS

TO THE BEST

PROFESSIONAL

ADVISERS

CHARITIES &

FOUNDATIONS

Charity trustees face increasingly complex governance,

operational and regulatory challenges. We seek to

reduce some of those challenges by ensuring the

investment portfolio operates at peak efficiency to meet

your charity’s objectives.

Our investment managers draw on their considerable

experience to understand your charity’s objectives, risk

profile and ethical investment requirements.

We then work with the trustees to construct or

implement an investment policy statement and help

to ensure individual investments within the portfolio

do not contravene the charity’s stated operational or

ethical objectives.

We offer clear and concise reporting to charity trustees

to enable you to assess performance against stated

benchmarks and to review individual holdings against

your investment policy statement.

Communication is essential, especially regular and

face-to-face meetings with charity trustees. We do not

employ relationship managers because we want you to

have confidence in your investment managers and we

believe you cannot have that relationship via a third

party.

The range of charitable sectors we have experience in is

very broad and includes education, religious orders, and

environmental.

RESPONSIBLE

INVESTMENT & ESG

Some clients seek to incorporate certain ethical, religious

and/or sustainable investment criteria into their portfolio

that are particularly important to them. These may extend

beyond our general responsible investment approach

by seeking to exclude particular companies or industry

sectors from a portfolio.

We use a third party ethical screening company to help

us exclude companies that profit directly from tobacco,

weapons manufacture, etc. It also helps to highlight

those companies that demonstrate commitment to

achieving the highest standards and are proactive

in areas such as corporate ethics, social justice and

environmental impact. Each client has their own ethical

criteria and yours will be applied when you meet your

investment manager.

We do not use a one size fits all approach, ensuring that

you will not feel obliged to invest in any area that you

are not comfortable with.

11



RISK &

SAFE CUSTODY

RISK

Ultimately, the level of risk in your portfolio is determined

after discussions with your investment manager and is

based on your attitude towards and appetite for risk.

However, all investments can rise as well as fall.

All portfolios can experience volatility in the short term,

so our investment managers focus on understanding the

risks and act to minimise them. These might be a move

in interest rates affecting the housing market, a new

technology disrupting a mature sector, or geopolitical

relations influencing the mood of investors.

This requires a deep understanding of each investment

and its risks. Diversification by sector, asset class and

geography help to further mitigate specific risks.

The investment timeframe you determine will be

considered by your investment manager to ensure you

can weather any short-term volatility and achieve your

investment objectives.

PERSHING

To ensure your assets are wholly ring fenced from

creditors and administrators of the investment manager,

these are held by Pershing Securities Ltd (“PSL”) and

Pershing (Channel Islands) Ltd (“PCI”) rather than in

Vermeer Partners’ nominee account. Pershing is part of

The Bank of New York Mellon, one of the world’s largest

and most secure custody banks.

CLIENT CASH

Pershing uses a carefully selected panel of 10 to 12 high

quality banks to minimise institutional risk.

OPERATIONS

In addition, PSL looks after our trading, clearing and

settlement functions:

• trading is covered on a 24-hour global execution

basis through desks in London, New York and Asia,

to which we have direct access

• access to clearing and settlement of a wide range of

instruments across more than 40 markets

PSL also provide our investment management software,

reporting and investor portals. Pershing is a leader in

these fields, allowing us to concentrate on managing

clients’ investments.



Vermeer Partners

T

E info@vermeerllp.com

The information and services described in this publication are not intended for persons outside the United Kingdom.

The value of investments and the income derived from them may go down as well as up and you may not receive

back all the money which you invest. The investments and investment services described may not be suitable for you.

Any information relating to an investment or an investment service is not a reliable indicator of future performance

of the investment. No tax advice will be provided and clients will need to seek advice from their independent tax

adviser. Fluctuations in the rate of exchange may have an adverse effect on the value, price or income of non-sterling

denominated investments. This brochure is for information purposes only. Information contained in it is not intended

to be an offer to buy or sell securities and this brochure should not be regarded as an offer or solicitation to conduct

investment business as defined in section 21 of the UK Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (FSMA). Nothing in

this brochure is intended to exclude or restrict any duty or liability which Vermeer Investment Management Limited

may have under the FSMA (or any subsequent amending or replacement legislation) or the rules and regulations for

the conduct of business made thereunder. For the purposes of FSMA this brochure has been approved by Vermeer

Investment Management Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN: 710280).

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