Dear shareholders,

I am pleased to report a NAV per share total return of 9.0% for the six months to 30 June 2026, extending our long-term track record of 10.7% annualised since inception in 1988, with less volatility than equity markets.

Compounding at this rate over decades requires both the ability to capture growth and the discipline to protect capital when markets fall. Our portfolio is carefully constructed to do just this. In the first quarter of 2026, when global equity markets fell -2.0%, our portfolio delivered +1.6%. With more settled markets later into the period, we captured 71.4% of the index return for the first half of the year.

Investing through structural change
We have long argued that two structural forces are reshaping the global investment landscape: the transition toward a more fragmented, multipolar world and the AI-driven technological revolution. Both themes are now playing out, and in many respects accelerating faster than we first anticipated.

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz during the period made clear what a multipolar world means in practice. The security of global shipping routes, energy supply, and strategic resources can no longer be assumed. Governments are responding; investing in energy independence, defence capability, and industrial resilience.

Germany has launched its largest defence and infrastructure spending programme since reunification, while Japan has committed to doubling its defence budget by 2027 and accelerated investment in domestic semiconductor manufacturing. Latin America and the broader emerging world are also increasing emphasis on economic resilience, creating the conditions for a more durable growth cycle. We believe this broadening of investment opportunities beyond the United States is a structural shift that remains in its early stages.

This backdrop also strengthens the case for real assets. We established an oil position ahead of the Iran conflict and subsequently exited it, realising meaningful gains. Looking further ahead, commodity supply constraints are likely to prove more persistent than markets currently anticipate, which could support the case for commodities.

Meanwhile, the AI revolution is entering a new phase. The investment opportunity is shifting beyond infrastructure and toward applications, as AI begins to automate increasingly complex knowledge work. We expect fewer but larger winners in this cycle; category leaders whose advantages compound over time. Access to those companies, before they reach public markets, is where we see the greatest opportunity.

Portfolio positioning and performance
Performance over the period reflected the benefits of the portfolio changes we have undertaken over the past two years. Private Investments were a notable driver, supported by landmark realisations and meaningful valuation gains. Uncorrelated Strategies provided an important ballast during the sharp sell-off of the first quarter. Our Quoted Equities book lagged the narrow, US technology-led rally of the second quarter, an unsurprising outcome given our deliberate geographic diversification toward opportunities elsewhere. We expect a broadening of market leadership to benefit this area of the portfolio.

Quoted Equities, our largest allocation, returned 7.8%. During the period we appointed Carrhae Capital, adding specialist emerging markets capability in a region where we see compelling long-term opportunity.

Private Investments returned 9.1%. Our network has placed us in a privileged position: investing early, alongside the best partners, in what we believe are category-defining companies. Over the past two years, we have realised more than 43% of the private portfolio, generating £569m, in a market where realisations remain broadly muted. Realisations on our direct private investments over this period were at an aggregate 70% above their carrying value.

SpaceX completed its initial public offering during the period, representing one of the most significant private realisations in RIT’s history. At the point of IPO, our investment in SpaceX produced an unrealised gain of £110m, or 4.0x our invested capital in the Private Investments pillar. We added to our positions in Anthropic and Databricks, both central to the AI era. We initiated new investments in Cognition, which is building the agentic AI layer, and Stripe, one of the defining application layer businesses of this decade. Deployment remains disciplined and selective, focused on our highest conviction themes. RIT is one of the very few listed vehicles through which shareholders can access leading private companies before they reach public markets.

Uncorrelated Strategies returned 5.6%. Gold and our absolute return managers provided steady diversification during the sharp risk-off move of the first quarter. Macro managers contributed strongly through the second quarter.

Outlook
Looking ahead, we are very mindful of the risk of more persistent inflation, particularly given the elevated valuation levels of markets. We are watching two dynamics closely.

First, global monetary conditions have tightened. The US Federal Reserve rate cuts delivered in late 2025 have given way to expectations of further hikes in the coming months, as inflation has proved both higher and more persistent than anticipated. More importantly, long-end bond yields have remained elevated due to both Middle Eastern tensions and a resilient global economy. The substantial fiscal commitments now being made to defence, energy security and industrial policy, along with massive spending on AI infrastructure, are themselves likely to prove inflationary over the medium term, even if they ultimately help bring inflation down over time.

Second, the AI investment narrative is diverging. Whilst public markets remain enthusiastic about infrastructure and semiconductor companies, there are growing questions about the scale of returns on the very high levels of capital expenditure. We believe in time, the greatest value will be created in the
application layer, where companies with proprietary models, unique data, and scalable businesses can build lasting competitive advantages. We continue to favour expressing our AI conviction through private markets and have reservations about the levels of public market excitement around semiconductor stocks.

The structural forces we have identified are strengthening rather than fading. The commitment to building resilience outside the United States is improving the growth outlook for non-US economies, and we see more compelling opportunities in those markets than at any point in recent memory.

In a world of structural change, RIT is built to thrive. Our unique combination of disciplined top-down asset allocation, rigorous bottom-up selection, permanent capital, and access to what we believe are
exceptional private investments is designed for precisely this environment. Capturing growth, managing risk, compounding wealth. That is what we aim to do for our shareholders.
We thank you for your continued trust and support.

Yours sincerely,

Maggie Fanari
Chief Executive Officer, J. Rothschild Capital Management Limited

Read our Half-Yearly Report to June 2026 here.