2. Individual Investor

    Frequently Asked Questions

  3. Below you'll find answers to the questions we get asked the most

    We are a Global investment manager; we are currently managing 12 Investment Trust and 34 OEIC (Open Ended Investment Companies) Funds which we market to UK Investors. You can find more detail on what we do on our Actual Investors page, Actual Investors | Baillie Gifford | Baillie Gifford.

    What do Baillie Gifford not do?

    We don’t offer direct investment in ISAs, SIPPs/Personal Pensions or Savings Plans and we do not offer wealth management services. We are also not regulated to offer investment or financial advice. If this is something that you needed, My Local Advisor is a website that allows you to search for authorised intermediaries in your area. You can visit their site on www.mylocaladvisor.co.uk.  

     

     

     

    You can invest directly with us into our OEIC funds or by using a third party. You cannot invest directly into our Investment Trusts with us, you can do this by using a fund platform as detailed below.

    Investment Trusts

    If you want to invest in our investment trusts, we do not have the facility for you to do this directly, you can invest using a stockbroker, a fund platform or a third party. You can find details of fund platforms that we know offer our trusts on the How to Invest section of our website, How to Invest | Baillie Gifford | Individual Investors | Baillie Gifford. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list and there could be other providers that you can use to buy our trusts.

    OEICs (Open Ended Investment Companies)

    If you want to invest in our OEIC funds, you can do this directly with us or you can invest through a fund platform, you can view the fund platforms by accessing our website at How to Invest | Baillie Gifford | Individual Investors | Baillie Gifford. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list and there could be other providers that you can use to buy our OEIC funds.

    If you wish to invest directly, investors can invest by telephone up to £100,000. Our minimum investment amount for a new investor is £100,000 and the minimum top up amount for an existing investor is £1000. Telephone dealing is available for investors with the exception of our non-UCITS funds which are Diversified Growth Fund, Multi Asset Growth Fund, Long Term Global Growth Investment Fund and Positive Change Fund. You can do this by contacting our dealing team on 0800 917 4752. Calls may be recorded for training and monitoring purposes. For our non-UCITS funds we require all instructions to be in writing. 

    Provided the dealing team can carry out a successful electronic check on your identity, they can proceed and open an account for you.  They would then provide you with bank details to transfer funds to us. Please note that before investing, our Dealing team will ask you to confirm that you have read the latest Key Investor Information Document and Supplementary Information Document for the fund, these can be obtained from the ‘Documents’ section of our website for the fund that you are interested in or by contacting our Client Relations team on 0800 917 2113 or emailing us at literature@bailliegifford.com. Calls may be recorded for training and monitoring purposes.

    New investors should complete our application form. You can download these forms from the ‘Documents’ section of our website for the fund that you wish to invest in, or we can send these to you. If you wish the form to be posted, please contact our Client Relations team on 0800 917 2113 or email us at literature@bailliegifford.com. Calls may be recorded for training and monitoring purposes.  The form can be returned by post to the below address.

     

    Baillie Gifford & Co

    Calton Square

    1 Greenside Row

    Edinburgh

    EH1 3AN

     

    Alternatively you can email the form to OEIC.Dealing@bailliegifford.com or fax the form to 0131 275 3954.

    If our dealing team could not verify your identity electronically, they would require two identity documents from you. You can find details of acceptable documents on our Checking Your Identity leaflet; the dealing team would supply this if documents were required.  

    Baillie Gifford is an investment manager and we’re not authorised to provide investment advice, the Money Advice Service can be a great place to start for further information for investment goals, or by engaging with a financial advisor.  If you did need advice, My Local Advisor is a website that allows you to search for authorised intermediaries in your area. You can visit their site on www.mylocaladvisor.co.uk.  

    At Baillie Gifford we exclusively invest for the long term across all our strategies as we believe this is where we can provide the best returns for our clients. We appreciate that the short-term share price moves of our funds, and underlying investments, can be a cause for concern. However, we do ask all our clients to share our long-term investment horizon. 

    In the short run, share prices can be volatile which we accept as long-term investors. Market sentiment and external news events can impact prices before considering what’s happening at an individual company. The stock market places undue emphasis on short term news flow and feels compelled to ascribe narrative to make sense of share price movements. But company progress doesn’t happen over a month or a quarter. Taking a view of at least five years on the prospects of each company we invest in helps us to focus on what eventually drives share price returns: the revenue and earnings growth achieved by each company. That’s where we focus our research and where we think we have an edge over the market.  

    Our strength lies in stock picking and being a patient supporter of these companies. It is our job to recognise signal from noise and we believe it’s important to concentrate on each individual company’s progress. We have conviction in this approach, and we will continue to focus our efforts on investing in the most innovative companies over this long-term time horizon.

    We regularly produce articles and webinars on our funds and trusts. If you wish to see the latest views from the fund managers, you can view these on the Insights page for each of our funds. You can view Fund information on;

    Funds | Baillie Gifford | Individual Investors | Baillie Gifford. We also produce Annual and Interim Reports for all our trusts and funds, you can view these in the Documents section for each fund. These include commentary from the managers and detail on holdings that they have bought and sold in the previous six-month period. The Key Information Documents and Key Investor Information Documents and Prospectuses for the trusts and OEIC Funds detail the risks associated with the trusts and funds. If you are unsure whether a trust or fund is suitable for you, as stated above we cannot provide advice, you may wish to consult a financial advisor.

    An investment trust can hold unlisted stocks and has gearing, OEIC (Open Ended Investment Companies) funds do not do this.

    Each has a different pricing method. An OEIC fund is single priced and has a daily valuation point. An investment trust has bid and offer prices and shares in the trust are traded on the London Stock Exchange.

    You can find more information regarding Investment Trusts on the Association of Investment Companies website.

     

    We do not have an online service for individual investors. If you do hold a direct account with us in one of our OEIC funds, we will send you account statements in February and August.  If you place a deal with us, we will send a contract note to you on the first business day after the valuation point at which we deal. Our Client Relations team can also provide you with account information by contacting them on 0800 917 2113 or by email at trustenquiries@bailliegifford.com.  Please note that you will need to have your Client Reference number to hand if contacting us.

    If you have an OEIC (Open Ended Investment Company) holding with us, please write to us at:

    Baillie Gifford & Co Ltd
    Calton Square
    1 Greenside Row
    Edinburgh
    EH1 3AN

    If you hold a share certificate for one of our investment trusts, your address will need to be updated with the main Registrar, Computershare. A share certificate will have a Shareholder Reference number typically starting with C00. You can write to them at:

    Computershare Investor Services PLC
    The Pavilions
    Bridgwater Road
    Bristol
    BS99 6ZZ

    You can also call them, contact telephone numbers for each trust are listed below;

    • Baillie Gifford China Growth Trust – 0370 707 1410
    • Baillie Gifford European Growth Trust – 0370 889 4086
    • Baillie Gifford Japan Trust – 0370  889 3221
    • Baillie Gifford Shin Nippon Trust – 0370 889 3223
    • Baillie Gifford UK Growth Fund – 0370 702 0000
    • Baillie Gifford US Growth Trust – 0370 702 0000
    • Scottish American Investment Company – 0370 707 1282
    • Scottish Mortgage Investment Company – 0370 707 1300
    • Pacific Horizon Investment Trust – 0370 707 1229
    • Monks Investment Trust – 0370 707 1170
    • Edinburgh Worldwide Investment Trust – 0370 707 1643

    Please note that if you hold a share certificate for Keystone Positive Change Trust, the main Registrar for this trust is Link Asset Registrars. Their address is as below;
     
    Link Group
    10th Floor
    Central Square
    29 Wellington Street
    Leeds
    LS1 4DL
     
    You can contact them by telephone on 0371 664 0300 or by email at shareholderenquiries@linkgroup.co.uk.

    If you held a Share Plan, ISA or Children’s Savings Plan previously with us, please note that we no longer hold these plans, they were transferred to Hargreaves Lansdown in August 2019 unless you specified that you wished to transfer to another provider.  Hargreaves Lansdown can be contacted on 0117 900 9000 or at the below address:

    Hargreaves Lansdown
    1 College Square South
    Anchor Road
    Bristol
    BS1 5HL

    No – we do not have the facility for you to buy our trusts direct from us. You can invest through a stockbroker, fund platform or another provider. You can view a list of available platforms on our How to Invest page.

    Application forms for our OEIC funds can be downloaded from the Documents section of the fund that you are interested in. Alternatively, you can contact our Client Relations team on 0800 917 2112 or email trustenquiries@bailliegifford.com and they can send these to you.

    Both of the figures include the total returns, however they are covering different time periods.  Periodic shows performance over 6 months, 1, 3 and 5 years from the date shown on the factsheet, whereas discrete is showing annual performance over specified 12-month periods.

    The share price is usually determined at 10am on a business day. This is known as the valuation point. If we receive your instructions to purchase shares before 10am on a business day, the shares will be purchased at that day’s valuation point. Otherwise the price will be based on the next day’s valuation point, this is known as forward pricing.

    You can find further information on pricing in the Fund Prospectus which can be downloaded from the Documents section of our website for the fund that you are interested in.

    We buy shares to three decimal points.

    If you choose to invest directly with us, the shares would be held as a direct investment, we do not offer an ISA, Junior ISA, SIPP or Child Trust Fund. We also do not offer an online service, therefore if you wish to deal it would need to be by telephone (with the exception of our non-UCITS funds) or by post.

    It would be your responsibility to check the terms with the fund platform you wish to transact with.

    Computershare Investor Services have a mailing list for our trusts. You can contact them on the numbers below:

    • Baillie Gifford China Growth Trust – 0370 707 1410
    • Baillie Gifford European Growth Trust – 0370 889 4086
    • Baillie Gifford Japan Trust – 0370  889 3221
    • Baillie Gifford Shin Nippon Trust – 0370 889 3223
    • Baillie Gifford UK Growth Fund – 0370 702 0000
    • Baillie Gifford US Growth Trust – 0370 702 0000
    • Scottish American Investment Company – 0370 707 1282
    • Scottish Mortgage Investment Company – 0370 707 1300
    • Pacific Horizon Investment Trust – 0370 707 1229
    • Monks Investment Trust - 0370 707 1170
    • Edinburgh Worldwide Investment Trust – 0370 707 1643

    Please note that if you hold a share certificate for Keystone Positive Change Trust, the main Registrar for this trust is Link Asset Registrars. Their address is as below;
     
    Link Group
    10th Floor
    Central Square
    29 Wellington Street
    Leeds
    LS1 4DL
     
    You can contact them by telephone on 0371 664 0300 or by email at shareholderenquiries@linkgroup.co.uk.

    You will need to register for our webinars via our website. Once registered, we will email you with a zoom link that you can use to join the webinar. Please note that you will need to download zoom before the webinar to ensure that you can join.

    Client Relations Team
    Telephone: 0800 917 2112
    Email: trustenquiries@bailliegifford.com

    OEIC Dealing Team
    Telephone: 0800 917 4750
    Fax: 0131 275 3954

    Baillie Gifford & Co Ltd
    Calton Square
    1 Greenside Row
    Edinburgh
    EH1 3AN

    You can complain to us by telephone by contacting our Client Relations team on 0800 917 2112, by email to IndividualInvestorComplaints@bailliegifford.com or in writing to us at:
     
    Client Relations Team
    Calton Square
    1 Greenside Row
    Edinburgh
    EH1 3AN.

    Our Complaint Handling Procedures leaflet has further information on our complaints process.

  4. The below section is intended to provide further information

    Please accept our sincere condolences. If you have to notify us of the death of one of our investors, we have set out some guidelines below.

    If the deceased person held an OEIC account with us, please send the death certificate with a covering letter to the address below:

    Baillie Gifford & Co
    Calton Square
    1 Greenside Row
    Edinburgh
    EH1 3AN

    Our team will then write to you detailing our requirements.

    If the deceased person held a share certificate for one of our trusts, please send the death certificate with a covering letter to the address below. You can identify if the holding is a certificate by the shareholder reference number, this will start with the prefix C00.

    Computershare Investor Services PLC
    The Pavilions
    Bridgwater Road
    Bristol
    BS99 6ZZ

    If the deceased person held a share certificate for Keystone Positive Change Trust, they have a different registrar to notify, the contact details are below;

    Link Asset Services
    The Registry
    34 Beckenham Road
    Beckenham
    Kent
    BR3 4TY

    You can also contact them by telephone on 0371 664 0300 or by email at shareholderenquiries@linkgroup.co.uk.

    If the deceased person previously held a Share Plan, ISA or Children’s Savings Plan, we no longer hold these plans. We undertook an exercise between April and August 2019, where our investors were given the option to transfer to Hargreaves Lansdown or to choose another provider. If the account has gone to Hargreaves Lansdown, they can be contacted on 0117 900 9000 or you can write to them at the address below:

    Estates & SIPP Closures
    Hargreaves Lansdown
    1 College Square South
    Anchor Road
    Bristol
    BS1 5HL

    We recognise that this is a deeply distressing time for you and would like to offer you some sources of further information.

    There is a free to use Death notification service called Life Ledger which helps to simply the notification process. You can notify Life Ledger of your bereavement and they will then act as a point of contact and notify all of the companies that you require that have registered with them, their website is below;

    Life Ledger is a free, easy-to-use death notification service

    Equiniti also offer a service called the Death Notification Service, this service allows you to notify them and they will then again pass on the information to the companies registered with them that you identify also need to be informed. Should you wish to contact them they are available at the following website https://www.deathnotificationservice.co.uk/ or by contacting them on 0333 2076574 from the UK or +44 121 4150965 from overseas.

    There are also charities that can offer you help and advice, including Cruse Bereavement Care, at https://www.cruse.org.uk/ or by telephone on 0808 808 1677, or the Samaritans, who can be contacted by telephone on 116 123 or by email to jo@samaritans.org.

    Please send us an original or certified copy of the Power of Attorney document. The certified copy must be certified by a solicitor. We also need to verify the identity of the Power of Attorney, an initial attempt will be made to verify your identity electronically, failing this we would require two identity documents. We will contact you if these are required.

    We recognise that there could be many different circumstances where you need further assistance. We’ve included the names of some charities that may be able to assist you;

    Please contact our Client Relations team on 0800 917 2112 or by email at trustenquiries@bailliegifford.com, the team can arrange this for you.