Laurence Hulse

The US indices, the US stocks, all have much better growth prospects.

And hopefully we'll get a chance today to talk about the current administration and environment in which the stock market sits.

But in terms of the discount,

I think it stays until there's fundamental policy change to make flows or encourage flow, incentivize flows to return.

And that's one of the reasons why a concentrated approach like ours has been able to outperform.

I'm not going to be, sadly, today, one of the fund managers that comes on and says small caps are ready to rock and roll.

That will come one day and I can't wait for it.

And I hope they'll still be around.

But at the moment, it's very stock specific, commanding.

You've got to command capital.

Before getting political, which I probably will.

Totally.

And that's the point.

You don't have to get political.

Where a fund manager like myself and, frankly, a citizen of the country gets cross is objective matters get really poorly executed, like when to have a budget.

Twice in succession now, the government have effectively waited till the last possible moment to announce what they're going to do.

Now, anyone with any grasp from a kind of GCC level of business studies or economics will know that businesses love certainty and predictability.

Well, delaying your budget for as long as possible is the opposite of that.

But it's particularly painful when there's leaks and speculation and there's an ability to front run based on said leaks and speculation and do real economic damage.

I don't think it's a coincidence that since the build up to last year's as late as possible budget, that the construction sector has really been struggling ever since.