During the year, our investments across the broad AI value chain supported performance. These were led by Amphenol, the connector and sensor leader, up 96%. Our holdings in Alphabet, the parent company of Google, and Nvidia, the advanced semiconductor company, ranked among our strongest performers for the year, up 66% and 39%, respectively. These were complemented by ASML, the semiconductor equipment leader, which was up 37%, on the back of improved order intake fuelled by AI-related demand and the reshoring of the global semiconductor industry and is up another 35% so far this year.
Our performance extended beyond the AI sector. RTX, the leading aerospace and defence supplier, was up 61%, driven by the ongoing strength in global travel activity and the structural uptick in defence spending. Leading pharmaceutical company, Roche, also raced ahead during the year, up 33%. Equally encouragingly, some of our consumer sector holdings, which had been weak in 2024 and the earlier part of 2025, began to inflect as the year drew to a close. Two of our holdings, the cosmetics manufacturer L’Oréal and the food and beverages goliath Nestlé, were both up 9%.
On the weaker side, macro and trade policy uncertainty weighed on some holdings, including material technology company Sika, which fell 23%, as large global construction projects were paused amid this environment and as the Swiss franc appreciated, significantly lowering the translated value of sales in US dollars and other currencies in Swiss francs. Our enterprise software holdings, Salesforce and SAP, were also down 20%. As we look into 2026, we believe these holdings are poised to perform as the policy environment ultimately stabilises and the market seeks opportunities beyond the immediate AI value chain.
This Investment Insight offers a detailed review and outlook for four key sectors we invest in: industrials, healthcare, technology and consumer.
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