Meet the manager: Rory Stokes
Portfolio Manager of The European Smaller Companies Trust.
If you weren’t a fund manager, what job would you do?
One of the things you don’t really get as a fund manager is that feeling of accomplishment that goes with something being “job done”. A good day, a good quarter, a good year are all instantly gone and you start all over. I think a job like a plumber where you have a real sense of tangible achievement would be fun – “you see that toilet? I unblocked that!”
What was the proudest moment of your career?
There doesn’t really seem to be room for pride in this job. I have always just felt luck to still be in the game and keen to press on rather than sitting back and feeling proud. Perhaps once I retire, I can offer a better answer!
I have always just felt luck to still be in the game and keen to press on rather than sitting back and feeling proud.
Rory Stokes, Portfolio Manager of The European Smaller Companies Trust
What was the most difficult moment of your career and why?
When I was a stockbroker, I wrote an email on a company where I thought the earnings quality had deteriorated to the point that a profit warning seemed inevitable. A “star fund manager” client of the firm got the email and along with the company chairman pushed for me to be fired. I was lucky that my boss and a couple of the senior management of the company I worked at backed me, but it was incredibly stressful. Fortunately for me the company had a massive warning a few weeks later and that put the subject to bed. Funnily enough the original work then became a springboard for me getting into the buy side, so it all worked out in the end.
What advice would you give to your 20-year-old self?
Lifting heavy things or riding your bike hard makes the negative voice in your head go away for a bit.
Away from the workplace, how do you spend your time?
I coach my kids’ football teams on the weekend and try to squeeze in a bike ride when I can.
Tell us about the last book you read.
I just reread some sections of Poor Charlie’s Almanack by Charles Munger. It’s a beast of a book you can dip in and out of over years with the curated wisdom of the investing legend himself, laced with good humour and insights that I find myself having to relearn again and again.
What is your favourite film of all time and why?
Oh, something lowbrow from the nineties or noughties. I don’t want to be challenged by a movie. Just entertained! Maybe Old School or Superbad or something like that.
In your personal life, what would you like to achieve in the next 12 months?
I am taking the sleeper up to Fort William with my eight-year-old son with the intention of climbing Ben Nevis this summer and I am really looking forward to doing something challenging together.
