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It’s in all probability truthful to say that VT Holland Advisors Fairness Fund isn’t instantly acquainted to numerous British buyers. Provided that the fund may be very a lot on the small facet (solely £39.3m), maybe that’s unsurprising. However VT Holland Advisors holds a handful of thrilling progress shares, and has delivered glorious outperformance.
Run by Andrew Hollingworth, it has returned 77.8% for the three-year interval to 30 June. That destroys its Funding Affiliation World Sector benchmark (25.7%), and likewise beats each the FTSE 100 and S&P 500.
Serving to drive among the latest portfolio outperformance has been a pair of prime progress shares (which I additionally personal). Let’s take a more in-depth have a look at them.
A snowball on the prime of a hill
The primary inventory is Nu Holdings (NYSE:NU), which is the agency behind Brazilian digital lender Nubank. It’s up 35% 12 months so far.
Nubank was constructed from the bottom up as a digital-only financial institution, with no bodily branches. It affords clients far superior and cheaper providers than the legacy banks throughout Latin America.
Our enthusiasm for Nubank is that we are able to see a possible revolution in its buyer providing vs sleepy, fats banking incumbents.
Andrew Hollingworth
In Q1, Nu grew its buyer base to an unbelievable 118.6m, including over 4m within the quarter. But it solely operates in three nations (Brazil, Mexico, and Colombia). And whereas round 60% of adults in Brazil are clients, the opposite two nations provide vital progress potential (by no means thoughts elsewhere).
That stated, the lender may come unstuck as its credit score portfolio grows. If the loss ratio worsens, that would shortly eat into margins and dent buyers’ confidence.
However, the agency’s fundamentals are spectacular. Common month-to-month income per buyer has elevated from $7 in 2022 to $11.20 in Q1 2025. However amongst longer-term clients who use extra of providers, that determine jumps to almost $26.
Because of this Hollingworth has described the corporate as “a snowball on the prime of a hill“. I agree, making this share price contemplating for the long run, for my part.
Basic disruptor
The second inventory I need to spotlight from VT Holland Advisors’ portfolio is one I lastly purchased earlier this month: Clever (LSE: WISE). This fintech inventory is up round 31% over the previous 12 months.
Clever helps folks and companies ship cash throughout borders shortly, cheaply, and transparently. Round two-thirds of the corporate’s new clients come by phrase of mouth.
The agency takes a minimize of the transfers, however what Hollingworth likes is how Clever retains decreasing charges because it scales (much like Nubank). Clever’s cross-border take fee in Q1 was 0.52% globally, down from 0.58% the 12 months earlier than.
The fund supervisor says that is “traditional disruptor behaviour“, with the agency “constructing a robust…[and] hard-to-copy scalable community“.
Wanting forward, Clever may face rising competitors, with rivals all seeking to take share within the huge £32trn cross-border cash market. A worldwide financial downturn would additionally probably sluggish fee volumes.
But, I believe Clever continues to be price contemplating proper now, together with VT Holland Advisors Fund. The latter’s portfolio of simply 30 shares does current some focus danger, however I reckon the supervisor’s technique to “discover nice corporations run by nice managers accessible at nice costs” will proceed to bear fruit.
