Schroders' Buxton: My ten stocks to back this year

Schroders' Richard Buxton has revealed the top ten stocks he is backing in his £2.7bn UK Alpha Plus fund heading into 2012.

Buxton's fund suffered during 2011 because of its focus on unloved stocks, but he said he is keeping faith with his positions, particularly in the miners where he expects returns could start to drive up share prices this year.

He said: "Here I really do feel there is material upside to be achieved, and quite possibly this year.

"The market clearly has concerns about the global outlook, specifically about a Chinese hard landing.

"It has marked these things down to levels where they are pricing in an absolute collapse in underlying commodity prices, with no scope for the generation of super-normal rates of return."

Buxton said while he was happy to trim his weightings in miners last spring, he has reversed this and started adding to his positions later in the year.

Miner Xstrata is still among his top ten heading into 2012, worth 3.4% of his fund, although overall he has roughly a market weighting in the basic materials sector.

His complete top ten holdings, and top ten active overweights at the end of 2012, can be seen below.

Top 10 positions overall (%)

10 largest active overweights (%)

 As at 31 December 2011. Source: Schroders