One of Australia's largest investment management funds has comfortably beaten consensus estimates in a year that defied global market volatility and wobbles on the home front.
A sluggish performance by the local bourse failed to spoil the party as Pinnacle Investment Management's executives paraded a fruitful year where horizons stretched overseas.
A continued UK expansion helped deliver the fund $176.9 million in profit - up 31 per cent in the year to June 30, as the firm shelved a strategy that has brought it incredible success Down Under for the past two decades.
The profit figure blew forecasts of about $150 million out of the water even though it held its final dividend flat at 60 cents a share - nudging marginally below expectations.
Pinnacle's funds under management soared to $229.4 billion across its 19 affiliates, which include Australian firms Metrics, Plato, Coolabah, Hyperion and Resolution Capital.
But its new favourite sons are London-based firms Life Cycle - now Pinnacle's largest affiliate - and Pacific Asset Management, expanding its minority stake bought in 2024 to gain full ownership in February.
"It's stating the bleeding obvious to express our absolute delight at the tremendous progress already with both Life Cycle Investment Partners, Pacific Asset Management," Pinnacle chief executive Ian Macoun said on Wednesday.
The boss defended taking a bigger slice of the UK investment outfit than they were used to with local firms.
"We have particularly prosecuted this model of minority ownership, it was appropriate in our market, but conditions are a bit different in the UK," Mr Macoun said.
"We are not expanding overseas seeking growth for growth's sake, arrogantly pursuing some kind of ego-trip ... we have been studying the opportunities overseas for most of the past 20 years. I don't think we could be accused of rushing in carelessly."
Australia's share market underperformed its global peers in the 2026 financial year, rising 2.8 per cent, compared to 20.8 per cent on Wall Street's S&P500, and a 23.8 per cent advance for the UK's FTSE100.
On the home front, Hyperion's ETFs presented the only flies in the ointment, with tech companies WiseTech, Cochlear, Xero and Life360 dragging its Australian Companies Growth Fund 9.8 per cent below its benchmark.
The affiliate's rough year meant only 81 per cent of Pinnacle's strategies outperformed their respective performance benchmarks over the five years to June 30, down from 91 per cent the year before.
"Confusion, speculation, exuberance in both directions surrounding AI in a variety of ways and the war impacting the oil price, geopolitics and inflation concerns generally have loomed large," Mr Macoun said of the depressed figure.
"Their time will come again, and their talents, experience, and processes will once again translate into compelling outperformance numbers."
But investors nonetheless liked what they saw, with strong buying lifting Pinnacle's share price almost 10 per cent higher to a nine-month high of $19.49.
