Can icapital.biz Berhad (ICAP) enjoy a similar outcome where its NAV discount vanishes ? The case for this is strong indeed. However, before we present it, one must first ask whether ICAP's NAV discount is a natural phenomenon or an artificial one.

In fact, keen-eyed investors, including the MSWG, should query City of London as to why they buy millions of ICAP shares (even going so far as to breach the regulatory 20% single shareholding limit) and consequently widen ICAP's NAV discount.

City of London used to pressure ICAP to conduct a 10% share buyback to narrow the NAV discount, while itself buying over 20% of ICAP's share capital, thereby worsening the discount it has been so persistently complaining about.

These complaints continue despite ICAP delivering an impressive performance on a consistent basis. So, what is really going on here ? Without all this interference, ICAP's share price would have been trading at a nice premium to its NAV by now, just like it did before City of London's persistent purchases.

ICAP's NAV performance over the course of its first 5,777 days was in fact superior to Scottish Mortgage's. And yet, ICAP still managed to preserve RM209 mln in cash or RM1.49 per share, poised to put it to good use at the nearest opportunity.

Perhaps Bursa Malaysia should make ICAP a constituent of the KLCI, just like the London stock exchange did with Scottish Mortgage.

On a side note, the Malaysian authorities should actively develop and promote the close-end fund industry. It will greatly benefit the Malaysian economy and capital market and thousands of retail investors.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 33 Issue 4 (www.icapital.biz)

Will icapital.biz Berhad's (ICAP) NAV discount be there forever ? Should ICAP not be wound up in order to realise its underlying asset values ?

Well, first of all, ICAP was set up by Tan Teng Boo as a CEF meant for long-term investors. How long is long ? Let us learn a few lessons from Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust PLC, an investment trust listed on the London stock exchange.

Lessons from Scottish Mortgage

Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust PLC (Scottish Mortgage) is an investment trust that aims to maximise total returns over the long term from a high-conviction, actively-managed portfolio. This is similar to ICAP.

It invests globally, looking for strong businesses with above-average returns.

It was launched in 1909, about 112 years ago. In comparison, ICAP is but a spring chicken.

Scottish Mortgage holds total assets of US$20.424 bIn.

It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.

Scottish Mortgage once traded at a persistent discount to its NAV. The discount disappeared in 2013, endowing its share price with a premium to NAV; in the last year or so, Scottish Mortgage's share price has traded around parity.

The share price of Scottish Mortgage rallied from around £44 in 1994 to above £1,300 in 2021, generating a massive gain of 29.5 times. An investment of $1,000 in 1994 would have been worth $29,500 in 2021. An investment of only $34,000 would have made one a millionaire.

The take-away here is that somebody who invested in Scottish Mortgage at a 15% NAV discount in 1994 would have gained "extra" returns from the disappearance of said discount. This is one of the most compelling strengths of a well-managed CEF - buy at a discount, sell at a premium.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 33 Issue 4 (www.icapital.biz)

Let me share some of the meaningful lyrics from the song "Yesterday When I Was Young":

Yesterday when I was young
The taste of life was sweet as rain upon my tongue
I teased at life as if it were a foolish game
The way the evening breeze may tease a candle flame
The thousand dreams I dreamed, the splendid things I planned
I always built, alas, on weak and shifting sand
I lived by night and shunned the naked light of day And only now I see how the years ran away.

As for the impeccable integrity of Capital Dynamics, let me quote the 1995 tribute I made to my father.

A Tribute To A Superior Man
According to Confucius, the great Chinese Teacher; there is a superior man and there is a small man. My father was a superior man. A superior man is one who is defined by his virtues, by his moral character: 2 virtues which Confucius emphasised as part of being a superior man are human-heartedness and righteousness. A rich man, a Datuk, can be a small man, for example. My father has always taught me to be a superior man. Integrity, trustworthiness and believing in honour were among his greatest hallmarks.

As a businessman, he does not believe in making money at the expense of others. He would rather work extra hard than to deceive others. We were not only taught not to cheat in our dealings but also not to be cheated. His word was his bond.

These virtuous teachings of my father run through the philosophy of i Capital and Capital Dynamics (the same applies to my mother as well, a fierce fighter of fairness and justice).

So, with the strong performance of icapital.biz Berhad and the impeccable integrity of Capital Dynamics, i Capital retains its long-term Buy rating on icapital.biz Berhad.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

Recently, a young lady from Ipoh shared with us how she was conned out of RM50,000 in just a short time by someone impersonating Tan Teng Boo in WhatsApp. As she explained, she "made" US$591.5 in only 3 nights by believing this con artist.

The impersonator even sent her a photograph of a 12-year-old girl, saying that she was Tan Teng Boo's granddaughter. The only problem is that the son and daughter of the CEO of Capital Dynamics are still single. The unwitting victim expressed her joy at earning US$591.5 in 3 nights.

We share this very valuable experience not to embarrass this young Ipoh lady but to show that it is so easy to lose one's money.

Whether it is due to a con person or through the plunging stock prices of Top Glove or ARKK or Amazon.com or many more, subscribers need to remember that the only way to achieve sustained high return is to consistently take low risk. And one needs to have the discipline to stick to this philosophy.

In May 2022, an 86-year-old person who has 3 types of cancer told Tan Teng Boo that he regretted not having invested in his Fund.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

At RM1.99, icapital.biz Berhad (ICAP) is capitalised at RM278.6 mln. For this, what do investors get in return?

[1] Strong performance of ICAP and [2] impeccable integrity of Capital Dynamics
In the issue dated 8 Dec 2022, we showed the strong performance of ICAP from various angles. Let me recapitulate this. Since its Oct 2005 listing, ICAP has outperformed the MSCI Malaysia index

We also show ICAP outperforming many global closed-end funds, including the Taiwan Fund, which is heavily weighted in semiconductor/technology stocks

In addition, the share price performance of ICAP has handsomely beaten that of Maybank

What we would like to share this week is that the share price of ICAP from 1 Jul 2020, until 22 Dec 2022, has solidly outperformed that of Amazon.com

Given the Covid-19 pandemic and the boom in e-commerce, an investor would have thought that the stock price of e-commerce giant Amazon.com would have surely beaten that of "boring" ICAP. The truth is that ICAP has outperformed Amazon.com by a huge margin.

The same pattern can be seen when comparing the stock prices of ARK Disruptive Innovation ETF (ARKK) with that of ICAP. ARKK is the flagship fund of Cathie Woods, and it invests in disruptive innovation or technologies. ARKK invests in companies like ZOOM, Tesla, Exact Sciences, Telodoc, Invite, Roku, Coinbase, Shopify, Nvidia, and many more such companies.

The facts show that ICAP is truly a low risk, high return stock. This is what investors get. As I have always advised, value investing is great as it forces one to think about the margin of safety. When an investor does this, it leads to a low risk, high return investment.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

3. Getting the right owners starts now !!

Taking into account the experiences of Scottish Mortgage, Pershing Square, Berkshire Hathaway, icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP), and the wisdom of Warren Buffett, it is obvious what the solution to ICAP's NAV discount is - get the right share owners, starting now. How can this be done?

Increase awareness of closed-end funds, in particular, ICAP, among individual investors;
Increase like-minded individual ownership;
Sustain individual ownership;

The specifics of this campaign will be revealed to the appropriate people at the appropriate time and place.

4. A Sincere Appeal

Unlike in London, New York, or Sydney, where closed-end funds or investment trusts are common, in Malaysia, we need to educate investors on the benefits of investing in ICAP, the only listed closed-end fund in Malaysia.

An effective, systematic, and sustained strategy for ICAP with the aim of increasing the ownership of individual investors or share owners will be implemented.

To quote Warren Buffett again: "virtually all of our shareholders are individuals, not institutions." This is what ICAP should aim for. The journey to achieving fewer or even zero institutional investors for ICAP will not be easy.

To achieve this important objective and permit the share price of ICAP to trade at a rational level, I will need the support of like-minded individual shareowners and here is my sincere appeal.

Share the benefits of owning ICAP shares with others, speak up at its AGM, participate in its Investor Day, and so on; I will need all available support.

Every step helps.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

2. A Simple Message

The messages from the experiences of Scottish Mortgage, Pershing Square Holdings, Warren Buffett, and our own icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP) are simple and very clear.

City of London (CoL) and gang bought more than 22% of ICAP shares, which is more than the permissible 10% share buyback, BUT the discount widened and persisted.

When institutional ownership was a measly 2.1% from Oct 2005 to Sep 2008, ICAP consistently traded at a premium to NAV for nearly 3 years, even without any share buyback or dividend payment.

In contrast, when the so-called institutional ownership jumped from zero in 2009, to over 23% now, ICAP then consistently traded at a widening discount to NAV.

Warren Buffett is spot on when he warned “Stocks heavily owned and constantly monitored by institutions have often been among the most inappropriately valued."
Let me repeat the most important point - the type and quality of shareholders matter.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

2. NAV Premium/Discount history of icapital.biz Berhad (ICAP)

From its first day of listing on 19 Oct 2005 (a 1% premium) to Sep 2008, except for a very short break in 2007, ICAP traded at a premium to its NAV for almost 3 years. Many investors are not aware of this crucial fact. In fact, ICAP's NAV premium reached a peak of nearly 26% in Jan 2008.

In Oct 2008, ICAP's share price plunged from a NAV premium to an 18.3% discount. What happened ?

In the 2005 IPO of ICAP, a Canadian institutional investor, Cundill Fund, decided to invest in 3.0 ml shares (or 2.14%) of ICAP's 140.0 mln issued shares, even though Capital Dynamics and Tan Teng Boo did not market the IPO shares to them. At that time, this was the only institutional investor of ICAP.

On 15 Sep 2008, the venerable Wall Street investment broker Lehman Brothers went bust. In Sep and Oct 2008, the S&P 500 plunged 30% in just a few weeks.
In 29 Jul 2008, the Canadian institutional investor still had 1.51 mln ICAP shares. By the next financial year, or May 2009, ICAP's sole institutional investor had sold all its shares. Judging from the volume of ICAP shares traded and the fact that the said Canadian institutional investor was suffering from redemptions and huge losses in its substantial exposure to the battered Japanese consumer financing companies like Takefuji, Aiful, Ancom, etc.), it was clear that ICAP's sole institutional investor sold all its shares in Oct 2008 or thereabouts and pushed it into a discount.

After that, the NAV discount started to narrow as it logically should. By Aug 2009, the discount was only 3.68%. Then, another apparently strange thing happened - the discount widened again. Why?

In financial year 2010, ICAP did not have anyone owning more than 5% of its issued capital or any publicly announced substantial shareholder (that is, 5% or more). However, by 2022, City of London Investment Management Company Ltd. (CoL) and gang have accumulated a massive total of 32,394,800 shares, or 23.14% of ICAP, and ICAP ends up getting stuck with a persistent and widened NAV discount.

Andrew Pegge of Laxey Partners owns 990,000 shares. In short, the more ICAP shares are in the hands of institutional investors, the worse the discount gets.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

1. d) icapital.biz Berhad (ICAP).

My 4th case study of why the type and quality of share owners or shareholders matter to the share price of a listed company involves our very own ICAP.

It should come as no surprise that the type and quality of shareholders matter to share price performance. I have been saying and doing the same thing ever since ICAP was promoted and listed in Oct 2005.

During the 2005 IPO of ICAP, Capital Dynamics intentionally took charge of its fundraising and roadshows instead of passing them to Kenanga, the investment banker at that time. This was done for two simple reasons.

First, Capital Dynamics did not charge ICAP any placement fees and related expenses of about RM2.000 mln, even though it was entitled to then, in order to boost the NAV of ICAP even before it was listed. Had Kenanga done the fundraising and roadshows, it would have charged ICAP a hefty amount.

Secondly, in conducting ICAP's IPO roadshows, I intentionally targeted only individual investors, and for the same reasons as Warren Buffett, I intentionally stayed away from institutional investors events years later have proven my fears correct). Why?
Based on my own experience, my views of institutional investors are exactly the same as Warren Buffett's: "You might think that institutions, with their large staffs of highly-paid and experienced investment professionals, would be a force for stability and reason in financial markets. They are not stocks heavily owned and constantly monitored by institutions have often been among the most inappropriately valued."

As Buffett said and as I have been doing since ICAP's IPO in 2005, "Our goal is to attract long-term owners who, at the time of purchase, have no timetable or price target for sale but plan instead to stay with us indefinitely."

Take a look at the share price performance of Malayan Banking (Maybank). From 2017 to 2022, Maybank's share price has performed very disappointingly. It is the top bank in Malaysia and is consistently and highly profitable. At the same time, Maybank offers consistently attractive dividend yields.

Despite all these attractions, Maybank's share price performance has been quite poor. Why ?

As Warren Buffett wisely advised, "stocks heavily owned and constantly monitored by institutions have often been among the most inappropriately valued" Not surprisingly, a very substantial portion of Maybank's shares are owned by local and foreign institutional investors.

Thanks to the well-thought-out and targeted approach by Tan Teng Boo in the 2005 IPO, on its very first day of listing on 19th Oct 2005, the share price of ICAP closed at an outstanding 1% premium to its NAV, when many people thought it would trade at a discount. The share price of ICAP then went on to handsomely trade at a persistent premium to its NAV until Sep 2008.

Unfortunately, the share ownership experience of ICAP since 2009 has turned out to be different from that of Scottish Mortgage (SMT).

In 2005, only 3 mln shares, or 2.14% of ICAP's shares, were held by a Canadian institution, which subsequently sold all its shares in Sep/Oct 2008 during Lehman's Panic and pushed it into a discount.

Regrettably, the institutional ownership of ICAP has now surged to 32.39 mln shares, or 23.13%. As a consequence, ICAP's NAV discount has widened and persisted. SMT has experienced the opposite.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

1. c) Berkshire Hathaway (BH).

Warren Buffett's long-term investment success through BH is well-known around the world. What is often overlooked in the long-term success of Warren Buffett and Berkshire Hathaway is the role played by its shareholders. Let me quote Warren Buffett on this fundamentally important factor in determining the success of a company's share price performance.

The quotes below are from his famous annual Letters to Shareholders, with the year indicated.

1983 Letter to shareholders
The key to a rational stock price is rational shareholders, both current and prospective.
In large part, however, we feel that high quality ownership can be attracted and maintained if we consistently communicate our business and ownership philosophy - along with no other conflicting messages.
Through our policies and communications – our "advertisements" - we try to attract investors who will understand our operations, attitudes and expectations. (And, fully as important, we try to dissuade those who won't.) We want those who think of themselves as business owners and invest in companies with the intention of staying a long time. And, we want those who keep their eyes focused on business results, not market prices.
People who buy for non-value reasons are likely to sell for non-value reasons. Their presence in the picture will accentuate erratic price swings unrelated to underlying business developments.
We will try to avoid policies that attract buyers with a short-term focus on our stock price and try to follow policies that attract informed long-term investors focusing on business values

1985 Letter to shareholders
Over the long term, there has been a more consistent relationship between Berkshire's market value and business value than has existed for any other publicly-traded equity with which I am familiar. This is a tribute to you.
Because you have been rational, interested, and investment-oriented, the market price for Berkshire stock has almost always been sensible.
This unusual result has been achieved by a shareholder group with unusual demographics: virtually all of our shareholders are individuals, not institutions.
You might think that institutions, with their large staffs of highly-paid and experienced investment professionals, would be a force for stability and reason in financial markets. They are not: stocks heavily owned and constantly monitored by institutions have often been among the most inappropriately valued.

1988 Letter to shareholders
Our goal is to attract long-term owners who, at the time of purchase, have no timetable or price target for sale but plan instead to stay with us indefinitely. Of course, some Berkshire owners will need or want to sell from time to time, and we wish for good replacements who will pay them a fair price. Therefore, we try, through our policies, performance, and communications, to attract new shareholders who understand our operations, share our time horizons, and measure us as we measure ourselves. If we can continue to attract this sort of shareholder - and, just as important, can continue to be uninteresting to those with short-term or unrealistic expectations - Berkshire shares should consistently sell at prices reasonably related to business value.

2020 Letter to shareholders
Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett feel a special kinship with "the million-plus individual investors who simply trust us to represent their interests, whatever the future may bring. They have joined us with no intent to leave, adopting a mindset similar to that held by our original partners. Indeed, many investors from our partnership years, and/or their descendants, remain substantial owners of Berkshire".


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

1. b) Pershing Square Holdings

The strategy of attracting individual investors was copied by Pershing Square Holdings (PSH), the 2nd largest closed-end fund in the world. Despite massively buying back its own shares and making regular dividend payments, PSH encountered the same NAV discount issue as Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust.

"In 2021, we increased our marketing efforts in the UK., specifically to retail investors and the 'platforms' they use, and remain focused on reaching a broader array of potential investors". In Mar 2021, PSH engaged a professional firm to cultivate demand across UK-based wealth managers and retail/adviser platforms, targeting individual investors (Source: 2021 Annual Report of PSH).


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust (SMT)
In icapital.biz Berhad's (ICAP) 2021 annual report, I wrote about Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust, an investment trust or closed-end fund listed on the London Stock Exchange. For some investors who worry about ICAP's NAV discount and whether it has an expiry date, SMT provides a wealth of valuable lessons to learn from.

SMT was launched in 1909, 113 years ago, and is still going strong with assets of US$11.36 bln. ICAP is only 16 years young.

SMT traded at a discount to its NAV for a very long time despite regular share buyback and dividend payments (City of London has stubbornly said that ICAP should follow SMT by buying back its own shares when the facts do not support such a move). However, SMT's NAV discount disappeared in 2013.

- Was the discount narrowing of SMT due to its persistent and hefty share buyback and/or regular dividend payment? The simple answer is no. What then caused such an outcome?
- The move from discount to premium for SMT was driven by increased demand from retail investors and an evolving ownership of SMT. For decades, a significant portion of SMT was owned by institutional investors, mainly UK pension schemes. They were persistent sellers, which drove the share price of SMT to a discount to its NAV.
- From 2010, SMT actively marketed itself to retail investors, who in the UK had begun taking greater control over their own finances via savings platforms. Consequently, the SMT shares owned by institutions plunged, from 54% in 1994 to only 17% in 2021.
- At the same time, share ownership by individuals jumped. It was a massive increase in ownership by individual investors that removed the NAV discount of SMT.
- Shareholders, or shareowners, existing and future ones, bear FULL responsibility for determining the share price of a listed company. So, whether the share price trades at a rational or irrational level, the type and quality of shareholders or shareowners of a listed company matters.

i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 18 (www.icapital.biz)

Two weeks ago, I showed some startling facts about the strong performance of icapital. biz Bhd (ICAP). In last week's issue, contrary to some misconceptions, I showed why ICAP is one of the most liquid stocks listed on the KLSE and shared the reasons for ICAP's success. In this final part, I will explain a proven strategy to manage the NAV discount or premium of ICAP.

1. The type and quality of shareowners matter

Few investors realised that the most important factor in determining the share price performance of a listed company, whether listed locally or overseas, is the type and quality of shareowners or shareholders that the listed company possesses. The right type will produce superior and sustainable business and share price performance; the wrong type will produce the wrong results. At this level, one can look at them from 2 aspects : institutional versus individual, and young versus old. I will look at 4 case studies to illustrate my point.

4. Why icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP) succeeds

Linked to reason number 3 is the fact that ICAP can control and have different levels of cash; ICAP does not have to deal with the inflow and outflow of funds, unlike open-end unit trust funds.

ICAP's fund manager is really the fund manager. In the case of unit trust funds, the underlying unit holders in aggregate are the real fund manager.

5. Why ICAP succeeds

Capital Dynamics, the fund manager of ICAP, is owner-operated. The branding of i Capital and Capital Dynamics is very precious to us.

We care a lot about individual owners - over the years, a special kinship has developed. In fact, it is the primary reason ICAP was set up in the first place in 2005 - to provide sound long-term investment to individual investors.

Since its conceptualisation, we have given our heart and soul to ICAP with integrity. For example, the IPO fund raising in 2005 was purposely done by Tan Teng Boo and Capital Dynamics - this saved ICAP around RM2 mln in fees in 2005. ICAP publishes a highly cost-effective annual report and IPO prospectus.

ICAP has unique Annual General Meetings, which have always been held on a Saturday. About 50% of the Investor Day expenses are borne by Capital Dynamics, which also provides the staff in conducting such laborious events.

Integrity - the most important of the 3 'i's for both i Capital and Capital Dynamics. Integrity is not the same as honesty. A crook can honestly tell you he or she is a crook. Integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one knows about it.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 17

3. Why icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP) succeeds

As a closed-end fund, the fund manager of ICAP, unlike the ubiquitous open-end unit trust funds, does not have to worry about redemptions (outflows of funds) _or inflows of new funds. Why is this feature such an advantage?

The fund manager of an open-end unit trust fund cannot predict and control the timing and size of such fund inflows and outflows, and this forces the said fund manager to act in ways contrary to sound investing.

There will be greed and heavy inflows when the stock market or a stock is bullish (this is precisely when stocks can generally be overvalued). This forces the fund manager of an open-end unit trust fund to buy stocks when caution is called for.

There will be fears, heavy redemptions, and an outflow of funds when the stock market or a stock is bearish (when stocks can generally be undervalued). This forces the fund manager of an open-end unit trust fund to sell stocks when the risks are low and when future returns are high. This is the time when investors and their fund manager should be brave.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 17

2. Why icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP) succeeds

There are many good reasons why ICAP has succeeded and why it will continue to do so.
ICAP does not engage in market timing, which is timing when bear and bull markets start and end, or predicting when a recession and recovery start and end. Why ?

It is generally difficult to be able to time the stock market and/or economic cycles accurately. Consequently, market timing cannot produce sustained superior investment results.

As explained at the 2022 Investor Day of icapital.biz Bhd, successfully buying low and selling high in terms of stock price over a prolonged period is extremely difficult, if not impossible.

ICAP deploys Tan Teng Boo's Bamboo value investing style. Why ?

It has been proven over a long period of time, it makes the most business sense, and more importantly, it produces a high return with low risk, which is the opposite of high risk and no return.

Unfortunately, many investors take high risks, thinking they will lead to high returns. Also, as explained at the 2022 Investor Day of icapital.biz Bhd, the bamboo value investing philosophy is a key pillar of Tan Teng Boo's investment framework. It allows an investor to be brave in a bear market and to be frightened in a bull market.

Buying low and selling high in terms of share price cannot produce sustainable superior performance.

Buying low and selling high in terms of business valuation, which is the essence of our bamboo value investing philosophy, produces sustained superior performance.

Let me use the example of Top Glove again. In last week's i Capital, we showed how bullish the so-called analysts were as the share price of Top Glove was skyrocketing. This week, we show what these analysts, who were essentially market-timers, were saying when the share price of Top Glove was plunging.

By Jun 2022, when the stock price of Top Glove had plunged nearly 90%, there were massive 301 'Sell' recommendations, and only 21 'Buy' ratings. By Nov 2022, most of the analysts had disappeared, leaving their poor clients stuck in Top Glove as 'long-term' investors.

If only these thousands of suffering investors had bought the so-called illiquid CAP shares instead. Well, as I have always advised, value investing is great as it forces one to think about the margin of safety. When an investor does this, it leads to a low-risk, high-return investment.

i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 17

In last week’s issue of i Capital, I showed some startling facts about the strong performance of icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP). In this week’s issue, I will show why ICAP is one of the most liquid stocks listed on the KLSE and the reasons for ICAP’s success.

1. How liquid are ICAP shares?

ICAP has 140 million shares outstanding. Unlike other listed companies, as a closed-end fund (CEF) or a collective investment scheme, ICAP is not permitted to have any controlling shareholder. Under the Securities Commission's CEF Guidelines, no single shareholder is allowed to own more than 20% of ICAP's shares.

In comparison, despite the fact that Hap Seng Consolidated Holdings Bhd has a massive 2.489 bln shares outstanding, for example, a single controlling shareholder, Gek Poh Holdings Sdn Bhd, directly owns 54.63% and indirectly owns another 8.01% via Hap Seng Insurance Services Sdn Bhd, for a massive combined total of 62.64% as at 31 Mar 2022.

In fact, the top 5 largest shareholders of Hap Seng Consolidated own more than a massive 86% of the company, as at 31 Mar 2022. In contrast, the top 30 shareowners of ICAP only own 42.5% of its issued capital as at 24 Aug 2022. Only 3.44% of its shareholders own 100,000 shares or less of Hap Seng Consolidated, whereas 21.3% of ICAP shares are held by shareowners who each own less than 100,000 shares.

Is Hap Seng Consolidated or ICAP a more liquid stock?

In financial year 2011, Gek Poh Holdings Sdn Bhd directly owns 53.48% and indirectly owns another 8.47% via Hap Seng Insurance Services Sdn Bhd for a combined total of 61.95% as at 30 Mar 2012.

In short, the controlling shareholder of Hap Seng Consolidated hardly increased its shareholdings from 2012 to 2022, but its share price shot up.

In contrast, in financial year 2011, ICAP did not have anyone owning more than 5% of its issued capital or any publicly announced substantial shareholder (that is, 5% or more).
However, by 2022, City of London Investment Management Company Ltd. (CoL) and gang have accumulated a massive total of 32,394,800 shares, or 23.14% of ICAP, and yet the share price of ICAP has hardly moved. Andrew Pegge of Laxey Partners owns 990,000 shares.

To buy 23% plus of any listed company without moving its share price shows how liquid ICAP shares really are and how easy it is for ordinary investors to buy lots of ICAP shares. See it this way - try to buy 23% of Hap Seng Consolidated and see how high its share price would skyrocket.

As I have advised repeatedly, "All truths are easy to understand once you discover them, but you have to discover them first." That buying ICAP shares is difficult is only a myth - I really wonder who created this falsehood and why.

Maybe so that there are no competing buyers?


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 17

Some investors would say that because icapital.biz Berhad (ICAP) sells at a NAV discount, they cannot get its full value when they want to retire and sell their shares. Is this focus correct ?

Imagine that this naive investor bought MPI instead of ICAP on 19 Oct 2005, thinking that since MPI is a fast growing semiconductor stock and not selling at a NAV discount, it is a better investment than ICAP.

Well, if this naive investor had wanted to retire and sell his MPI shares years later, he would have to sell them at a huge loss. By 2011, this naïve investor would have to sell his MPI shares at a massive loss of 75% even though he did not buy them at a discount.

In fact, this naive investor would have to wait for many years for the share price of MPI to just get back to RM1.00 while he would have doubled his ICAP investment by 2010 or 2011.

i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 16

For the record, icapital.biz Berhad’s (ICAP) superior performance is not just against Top Glove or other glove stocks. When it is compared with other closed-end funds, ICAP's share price performance stands out as well.

The comparison of ICAP with the Taiwan Fund is particularly insightful. The Taiwan Fund is extremely overweight in fast growing IT/technology /semiconductor stocks, with 66.3% of its NAV invested in this one sector alone.

Its investment in TSMC alone makes up a hefty 22.5% of its NAV. And yet "boring" ICAP has outperformed the Taiwan Fund, either in USS or RM terms. ICAP has also far outperformed the funds invested in India or South Korea.

ICAP's sustained performance, whether in terms of share price or NAV, is not a fluke shot. Take a look at the share price of Malayan Banking. On 19 Oct 2005, Maybank closed at RM8.26. By Nov 2022 or 17 years later, Maybank's share price has hardly moved.

Comparing the share price performance of Maybank with that of ICAP, one can see a huge difference in their performances. The share price of ICAP, even though it sold at a discount to NAV since 2010, has far outperformed the share price of Maybank. Few investors know this startling fact and instead focused on the wrong parameter.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 16

An investor who invested RM50,000 in Top Glove on 30 Jan 2020 would see his or her investment shrink to only RM22,500 by 31 Oct 2022. The icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP) investor would still have RM47,150, or enough to buy more than 54,000 Top Glove shares now.

An investor who invested RM50,000 in Top Glove shares on 30 Apr 2020 would see his or her investment shrink to only RM18,300 by 31 Oct 2022. In contrast, the ICAP investor would have seen his investment grown to RM53,750 in the same period, or enough to buy nearly 62,000 Top Glove shares now.

So if you are back in Jan 2020 or Apr 2020, would you buy the sexy and fast-growing Top Glove at a premium or the "boring" ICAP at a discount? Be honest; otherwise, you will not be able to discover the truth.

What is the most important investing lesson to be learned from this simple experience? When investing, the most important objective is to be able to sustain one's long-term investment performance.

Making money for a short while is very easy, especially when the trend is up. Sustaining one's investment performance through good and bad times is not easy and not something that most investors can achieve.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 16

In the last 3 years, investors have seen a lot of booms and busts.

Many of them are now stuck with the once-upon-a-time hot favourite glove stocks and have unhappily been forced to be truly long-term investors as these stocks have plummeted.

Many investors are also already stuck with the parabolic semiconductor/technology stocks, even though most of them have still got a long way to go before finally bottoming out.

Then, there are those who have seen their hard-earned savings or wealth disappear into thin air in the gigantic cryptocurrency collapse. Also, not forgetting the long list of naïve victims who were so easily scammed.

Sadly, what these investors do not realise or have overlooked is that there is a solid stock on the KLSE that investors could have bought and easily sailed through the last 3 difficult years without having to suffer all this pain, and be able to sleep soundly every night and still make a decent return.

I am always advising investors to buy the shares of icapital.biz Bhd (ICAP). Whenever I advise investors to invest in ICAP, some are easily convinced and would quite quickly go ahead and invest, but for others, I would get a few typical unenthusiastic responses.

They would say that ICAP is illiquid and that it is hard to buy its shares. Or they would complain that the stock is boring and its share price hardly moves. Then, there is the parrot-like narrative that ICAP's share price sells at a discount to its NAV.

Starting with this week's issue of i Capital, I will share with our subscribers some unnoticed reasons why ICAP has succeeded far more than what investors have realized or expected.

i Capital Newsletter Volume 34 Issue 16

To briefly recapitulate, the period from May 2014 to August 2022 was filled with the following major events: crude oil price plunging in 2015, a dangerous escalation in United States’ anti-China campaign since president Trump, the Covid-19 pandemic and a sharp recession breaking out, soaring inflation especially in the developed countries, aggressive monetary tightening especially by the US Federal Reserve, a strong US$, the Ukrainian Crisis, the plunging S&P 500 and NASDAQ Composite and Malaysia’s protracted political instability.

While the MSCI Malaysia index plunged 30.28%, your Fund’s NAV jumped 9.61%. Disappointingly, despite this strong performance in a most challenging period, your Fund’s market price fell by 15.19% (the returns of your Fund’s NAV and market price assumed the dividends paid in September 2013 and December 2021 were reinvested).

As some share owners have suggested, such an irrational behaviour needs to be probed further.

The performance of your Fund’s market price ultimately depends on the quality and behavior of its existing and potential investors, especially for a listed collective investment scheme like icapital.biz Berhad. Your Fund has nearly 3,300 share owners with a large majority of them owning less than 100,000 shares.

Given such a widely distributed ownership structure and the fact that your Fund does not have a controlling shareholder, a substantial shareholder of your Fund has a disproportionately large and unhealthy impact on your Fund’s market price.

A negative impact would see a large majority of shareowners suffering persistent price and NAV distortions.


i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

We compare the NAV and share price performance of icapital.biz Berhad in its 2022 financial year; that is, from 1 June 2021 to 31 May 2022 with that of the performance of Scottish Mortgage (SMT) over the same period.

On both counts, the performance of icapital.biz Berhad was way ahead of SMT. There are good reasons that the NAV discount of your Fund will eventually reverse.

The NAV and share price performance of your Fund is substantially better than that of SMT, itself a well-managed investment trust.

And yet, icapital.biz Berhad still has around RM155 million in cash or RM1.11 per share as at 15 September 2022, down from RM1.49 as at 31 May 2021, waiting to be put it to good use.

If the NAV discount of SMT can swing to parity or a premium, with a sound long-term investor education strategy, an appropriate ownership structure and continued superior investment performance, the same can eventually happen to icapital.biz Berhad.

With icapital.biz Berhad, share owners get a well-managed fund, founded on integrity, and offers excellent long-term prospects.

With an attractive compound rate of return, the best gains for icapital.biz Berhad are still ahead of us. It does not make sense to chop down a bountiful fruit tree before it has matured.

i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

Scottish Mortgage (SMT) is more than 113 years old and still growing. Your Fund’s age is a spring chicken in comparison. Stan Truhlsen, an Omaha ophthalmologist turned 100 on 13 November 2020.

In 1959, Stan, along with 10 other young Omaha doctors, formed a partnership with Warren Buffett, called Emdee, Ltd. When this partnership distributed its Berkshire Hathaway shares in 1969, all of the doctors kept the stock they received.

Two of Stan’s comrades from Emdee are now in their high-90s and continue to hold their Berkshire shares. Value investing succeeds because it goes hand in hand with a focus on the long-term.

Value investing demands patience and the ability to be a long-term investor. Longterm is defined not just in terms of years but in decades.

Can icapital.biz Berhad enjoy an outcome similar to SMT or Berkshire Hathaway where its share price trades at a rational level ?

The case for this is strong indeed and it used to be like that when individual shareowners own nearly 98% of your Fund.

i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

As we were working hard to educate the existing and potential individual investors about the benefits of owning icapital.biz Berhad and its time-proven value investing philosophy, your Fund’s institutional investors were undermining our well-thought out efforts by sending out wrong or “conflicting messages” about your Fund.

An example was the 2012 messy AGM, which prevented us from conducting our Investor Day for that year. Another instance was the public posting in August 2015 of numerous false allegations about icapital.biz Berhad and its fund manager by your Fund’s institutional investor.

Coincidence or otherwise, this led to the publication of a defamatory article by a senior editor of a local financial publication just a few days before the 2015 AGM of icapital.biz Berhad.

The consequences of these conflicting messages were to seriously damage the reputation of your Fund and grievously undermined the tireless efforts of the Board and Fund Manager to increase the individual ownership and deal with the discount problem.

Let me quote Buffett again : “The market price for Berkshire stock has almost always been sensible. This unusual result has been achieved by a shareholder group with unusual demographics: virtually all of our shareholders are individuals, not institutions.”

The annual general meetings of icapital.biz Berhad used to be a very joyous and productive engagement for all. My hope is that the 2022 AGM and those after that will be like them again.

The journey to achieving fewer or even zero institutional investors for your Fund will not be easy. We have to also undo the damages inflicted on your Fund by the institutional investors.

To achieve this important objective and permit the share price of icapital.biz Berhad to trade at a rational level, I will need the support of like-minded individual share owners and here is my sincere appeal.

Whether it is to share with other individuals about the benefits of owning icapital.biz Berhad or speaking up in its AGM or participating in its Investor Day, I will need all your support.

Every step helps.


i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

This brings me to our Investor Day. Unlike the London or New York stock market, where closed-end funds or investment trusts are common, in Malaysia, we need to educate investors on the many benefits of investing in icapital.biz Berhad, the only listed closed-end fund in Malaysia.

The Board and Fund Manager have been considering implementing an effective, systematic and sustained investor relations strategy for your Fund with the eventual aim of increasing the ownership of individual investors or share owners as we prefer to call them in icapital.biz Berhad.

Conducting the highly popular Investor Day was one of the activities held to achieve this objective of increased individual ownership.

However, your Fund’s institutional investor in September 2015 rejected this solution outright, arrogantly saying that it is not a discount control mechanism.

The experiences of Scottish Mortgage (SMT), Pershing Square Holdings (PSH), Berkshire Hathaway and your Fund have proven this rejection very foolhardy or perhaps the institutional investor wanted fewer individual investors to compete with them in buying the shares of icapital.biz Berhad.

With hindsight, our recommended strategy is the right step to take in future. For a start, the Investor Day of icapital.biz Berhad will be back, starting with the 2022 event.

Buffett correctly counselled : We feel that high quality ownership can be attracted and maintained if we consistently communicate our business and ownership philosophy - along with no other conflicting messages.


i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

That the type and quality of shareholders matter to the share price performance of Scottish Mortgage (SMT) or Pershing Square Holdings (PSH) or Berkshire Hathaway or icapital.biz Berhad frankly comes as no surprise to me.

icapital.biz Berhad’s own experience has the same message to deliver. I have been saying the same thing and doing the same thing ever since your Fund was promoted and listed in 2005.

During the 2005 initial public offering (IPO) of icapital.biz Berhad, Capital Dynamics intentionally took charge of its fund raising. This was done for two simple reasons.

First, Capital Dynamics did not charge icapital.biz Berhad any placement fees and related expenses of about RM2.000 million even though it was entitled to then in order to boost the NAV of your Fund even before it was listed.

Secondly, in conducting your Fund’s IPO roadshows, I intentionally targeted only individual investors and for the same reasons as Warren Buffett, I intentionally stayed away from promoting icapital.biz Berhad to institutional investors (events years later have proven my fears correct).

As Buffett said and as what I have been doing since your Fund’s IPO in 2005, “Our goal is to attract longterm owners who, at the time of purchase, have no timetable or price target for sale but plan instead to stay with us
indefinitely.”

The result of your Fund’s IPO was as I had expected – on its very first day of listing on 19th October 2005, the share price of icapital.biz Berhad closed at an outstanding 1% premium to its NAV.

The share price of icapital.biz Berhad then went on to trade at a persistent premium to its NAV until October 2008. Unfortunately, the ownership experience of icapital.biz Berhad has turned out to be different from that SMT.

While the latter saw a substantial decline in institutional ownership over the years and its discount disappearing, icapital.biz Berhad was cursed with a substantial increase in institutional ownership and a persistent discount problem.

In 2006 and 2007, only 3.000 million shares or 2.14% of your Fund’s shares were held by an institution, which sold all its shares in late 2008.

Regretably the institutional ownership of icapital.biz Berhad has now surged to 32.39 million shares or 23.13% and in the process, its NAV discount has widened and persisted.

Taking into account the experience of SMT, PSH and Berkshire Hathaway and the wisdom of Warren Buffett, it is obvious what the solution to your Fund’s nagging discount problem is – increase the ownership of individual investors.

How can this be done ?


i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

The long-term investment success of Warren Buffett is world famous.

What is often neglected in the long-term success of Berkshire Hathaway is the role played by its shareholders or more specifically, by the type and quality of its shareholders.

Let me quote Warren Buffett on this fundamentally important factor in determining the success of a company’s share price performance.

“Over the long term, there has been a more consistent relationship between Berkshire’s market value and business value than has existed for any other publicly-traded equity with which I am familiar.

This is a tribute to you. Because you have been rational, interested, and investment-oriented, the market price for Berkshire stock has almost always been sensible.

This unusual result has been achieved by a shareholder group with unusual demographics: virtually all of our shareholders are individuals, not institutions. No other public company our size can claim the same.

You might think that institutions, with their large staffs of highly-paid and experienced investment professionals, would be a force for stability and reason in financial markets.

They are not: stocks heavily owned and constantly monitored by institutions have often been among the most inappropriately valued.”

The messages from Warren Buffett are very simple and very clear.

He is not keen at all to attract institutional investors for very good reasons and that he and Charlie Munger have a special kinship for the million-plus individual investors of Berkshire Hathaway.

As he explained in 1985 and many times after that, “stocks heavily owned and constantly monitored by institutions have often been among the most inappropriately valued.”

As a long-term value investor myself, I cannot agree with Buffett more.


i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

The strategy of attracting more individual investors has been copied by Pershing Square Holdings (PSH), the 2nd largest closed-end fund in the world.

Despite massive share buyback and regular dividend payments, Pershing Square Holdings encountered the same NAV discount issue.

The Board of PSH “believes that the best way to close the discount is for PSH to attract long-term investors by continuing to deliver strong investment performance over time. We can also do more to increase awareness of our performance and our strategy among investors. In recent years the Board has actively taken steps to broaden our investor base by securing a listing on the London Stock Exchange. Our subsequent elevation to the FTSE 100 index has increased the visibility of PSH to investors. In 2021, we increased our marketing efforts in the U.K., specifically to retail investors and the “platforms” they use, and remain focused on reaching a broader array of potential investors” (2021 Annual Report of PSH).

In March 2021, Pershing engaged Frostrow to cultivate demand across UK-based wealth managers, retail/adviser platforms, targeting individual investors.

i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

In last year’s annual report, I wrote about Scottish Mortgage (SMT), an investment trust or a closed-end fund listed on the London Stock Exchange and a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index.

For some investors who kept asking about the NAV discount of icapital.biz Berhad and whether your Fund has an expiry date, SMT offers plenty of lessons to learn from.

SMT was launched in 1909, about 113 years ago and is still going strong with total assets of US$11.36 billion (icapital.biz Berhad is only 16 years young). It once traded at a persistent discount to its NAV.

After around twenty years, its NAV discount disappeared in 2013, endowing
its share price with a premium to NAV before trading around parity.

After I wrote about SMT in the said annual report, some uninformed investors, especially those from overseas, say that icapital.biz Berhd should follow SMT by buying back its own shares.

Was the discount narrowing of SMT due to its share buyback and/or dividend payment ? The simple answer is no.

The move from discount to premium was primarily driven by increased demand from retail investors and an evolving ownership.

For decades, a significant portion of SMT was owned by institutional investors, mainly UK pension schemes. By the end of the last century, these investors had become disengaged with the investment trust structure as new open-ended pooled vehicles allowed greater operational efficiencies.

They were persistent sellers which drove the share price to a persistent discount to NAV. From 2010, SMT was more proactively marketed to retail investors, who in the UK had begun taking greater control over their own finances, via savings platforms.

Consequently, the SMT shares owned by institutions declined substantially, from 54% in 1994 to only 17% in 2021. At the same time, share ownership by individuals jumped.

It was the massive increase in ownership by individual investors that essentially removed the NAV discount of SMT.

Shareholders, existing and future ones, ultimately bear the responsibility of determining the market price of a listed company. So, the type and quality of shareholders matter.


i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

Once again, despite a very tough and rough environment, icapital.biz Berhad has achieved a superior NAV and share price returns of 19.60% and 7.71% respectively for the two years ended 30 September 2022.

Both have strongly outperformed the 12.77% plunge in the bellwether MSCI Malaysia index. Remember, icapital.biz Berhad is ideal for investors looking for a low-risk, high-return fund.

With over RM150 million still in cash reserves and Capital Dynamics’ time-proven value investing philosophy, it is an excellent time to invest more in icapital.biz Berhad.

This year, the highly popular and productive Investor Day will be back. It will be held on Saturday, 26th and Sunday, 27th November at the KL Convention Centre. Learn for yourself why icapital.biz Berhad works.

Finally, let me repeat what I think is a very important point to my fellow Malaysian shareowners - do not let any investor who refuses to think and act like a share owner destroy a precious gem like your Fund.

Do participate in its coming Annual General Meeting and make your ownership counts. It can help narrow the NAV discount.

i Capital.biz Berhad 1Q2023 Report

Last year’s AGM was held on 20th November 2021. In the question and answer session, I spent quite a fair bit of time explaining why share buyback does not and will not work for icapital.biz Berhad.

Let me update our share owners on this unproductive matter.


I used the example of Top Glove’s loss-making share buyback in last year’s AGM. On 19 November 2021, its closing price was RM2.31. On 30 November 2021, it closed at RM2.92. On 15 September 2022, Top Glove’s share price closed at RM0.765.

In short, since then, Top Glove’s share price has collapsed a further 67% and 74% respectively.

A share buyback of RM1.0 billion by Top Glove, for example, would have seen a further massive loss of RM670 million or RM740 million. In April 2022, Starbucks, the world’s leading coffee chain, suspended its share buyback program as Howard Schultz takes command again.

Schultz explained that the share buyback programme is suspended so that Starbucks can “invest more profit into our people and our stores.” Starbucks like Amazon.com and Apple Inc has seen a rising worker rights campaign that has seen many of their store workers voting to unionize.

In short, share buyback is destroying Starbucks in the long-term.


i Capital.biz Berhad 2022 Annual Report

An investor needs to match his or her own investment objective with the investment product before investing.

As Tan Teng Boo explained, to understand icapital.biz Berhad better and see if it is suitable for your investment needs, think of two types of properties: Property A as an empty land and Property B as a shop house.

Question: which type of property is suitable for your investment needs? If you are looking at an investment that can provide you with regular income, obviously buying a shop house with rental would be the most suitable.

If you are looking for an investment that offers high long-term capital appreciation, buying a piece of land would be far superior. In Malaysia, just think of the property tycoons that bought empty pieces of land 40 or 50 years ago in places like Bangsar, Bandar Utama, Subang Jaya, etc. and sat on them and let the land appreciate in value.

Investing in icapital.biz Berhad is like buying such a piece of empty land. icapital.biz Berhad calls its investors "share owners" instead of "shareholders".

icapital.biz Berhad is certainly meant for the serious long-term investors,
people who want to be able to sleep soundly at night and then wake up later to see their asset value has appreciated substantially.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 30 Issue 1

The intellectual approach towards investing in the stock market differs greatly between those who time the market or stocks and those who practise value investing.

For the former, the market index or stock price is just a number to predict, making it in essence similar to gambling or speculating; for the latter, the market index is meaningless and irrelevant while the stock prices are to be used only in comparisons with the intrinsic value of a stock or business.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 31 Issue 36

Many investors and investment analysts have failed to understand that icapital.biz Berhad is ideal for investors looking for a low-risk, high-return Malaysia focused fund.

icapital.biz Berhad's strong performance is not a fluke shot and its consistency is but the logical result of its fund manager's Bamboo value investing philosophy.

Developed by Tan Teng Boo, this eclectic investing style has proven itself time and again throughout a variety of financial market and economic conditions, including the 2020 pandemic recession and our current bear market.

i Capital Newsletter Volume 33 Issue 36

Barring unforeseen circumstances, the odds favour the NAV of icapital.biz Bhd exceeding RM1 bln or RM7.14 per share.

icapital.biz Bhd is easily the most undervalued company on Bursa Malaysia and remains a misunderstood company; such a combination smells of a unique investment opportunity.

This is without taking into account the future strong increase in NAV.

In a world filled with uncertainty, icapital.biz Bhd represents a solid long-term investment.

If a subscriber starts with only RM500, and makes a monthly regular investment of RM500 and icapital.biz Bhd generates a return of only 8% per annum, the subscriber would have a total of RM251,278 in 224 months (18 years and 8 months).

If the return rises to 15% per annum, well, the end result will be much higher.


i Capital Newsletter Volume 33 Issue 7

Capital Dynamics did not get to be Asia's first global investment firm without good reasons. As an independent investment firm with no ties to the large investment banks or stockbrokers or political organisations, Capital Dynamics has no choice but to rely on its own brain power and internal resources to survive and succeed.

Capital Dynamics just has to be damn good in what it does.

Or else Capital Dynamics would not have been able to be around since 1989 in one of the toughest industries there is. And damn good Capital Dynamics has been, since 1989.

It is not just the deeply respected weekly i Capital (or www.icapital.biz) but also in the local and global funds that Capital Dynamics manages (bear in mind that Capital Dynamics does not have any agents selling its funds or its weekly i Capital) and the way Capital Dynamics has stubbornly stuck to its integrity principle.

Capital Dynamics has been damn good since 1989 because of one very good reason.

Tan Teng Boo, its CEO, makes sure that Capital Dynamics conducts solid, comprehensive primary research (not secondary research) and as a consequence, consistently produces world-class analysis on a wide range of subjects, which then enables Capital Dynamics to make far-sighted, wise investment decisions.



i Capital Newsletter Volume 33 Issue 40

The performance of icapital.biz Berhad has been outstanding, not just in terms of its NAV but also its share price over many years. Whether it is low inflation or high inflation, whether it is rising or falling interest rate, icapital.biz Berhad has consistently delivered superior returns to its shareowners and is still boasting of a substantial cash-laden war chest.

Let me recapitulate a fundamentally important point. A well-managed closed-end fund like icapital.biz Berhad is an excellent investment product for individual investors, especially during tumultuous times like now.

However, after so many decades, there is sadly still only one closed-end fund listed on Bursa Malaysia. The world-class London, Sydney and New York stock exchanges abound with hundreds of closed-end funds. Their investors have so many choices in terms of investment products.

Let me repeat what I think is a very important point to my fellow Malaysian shareowners - do not let any investor who refuses to think and act like a share owner destroy such a precious gem. It is indeed strange that the more a large foreign shareholder accumulates the shares of your Fund, the wider the discount becomes and persisted.

When your Fund was trading at a premium for many years, there was no such large foreign shareholder present. One does not need the IQ of Einstein to put two and two together. This is just my simple-minded observation.


icapital.biz Berhad 4Q22 report – commentary by fund manager