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WPCT sees £43m drop in value of Prothena stake

WPCT sees £43m drop in value of Prothena stake

WPCT sees £43m drop in value of Prothena stake value

Woodford Patient Capital Trust (WPCT) lost £43m on its investment in Prothena last month, following the failure of the company’s NEOD001 for AL amyloidosis, according to an analysis of its portfolio by Marten & Co.  Having for some time last year been WPCT’s largest investment, Prothena dropped from second to tenth position in April, according to the latest portfolio update.

The effect of Prothena was evident in the 6% fall in NAV reported by the trust in April and 5.6% decline in share price, which ranked it bottom of the 13 biotech-specialist closed end funds monitored by Marten & Co.

WPCT’s two largest investments are now Oxford Nanopore and BenevolentAI, both of which have completed private shareholdings in recent months, and combined account for 20% of NAV. The April update shows that these shareholdings both increased in value by just over £11m, to £73m and £66m respectively, as a result of their fundraisings, although it is not clear how much of this was derived from WPCT’s participation in the deals and how much came about from a revaluation of previously held shares.

Nevertheless, WPCT may see a gain on its investment in Atolus, depending on the outcome of the company’s proposed Nasdaq IPO.  The company recently filed a registration statement having made an a confidential filing in March, but has yet to move to the next stage by disclosing a price range and target filing amount.

WPCT’s top 10 investments as of end April, expressed as a percentage of NAV, are shown in the table below.

Company  % NAV 
Oxford Nanopore 10.71
Benevolent AI 9.69
Immunocore 7.7
Purplebricks 6.37
Proton Partners 5.82
Atom Bank 5.04
Mereo Biopharma 4.71
Autolus 4.71
Oxford Sciences 4.04
Prothena 3.38

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