Schroder Real Estate (SREI) says Peter Lowe, head of UK Real Estate Investment at Schroders Capital, will replace Nick Montgomery as lead manager once its joint acquisition of Picton Property (PCTN) with LondonMetric (LMP) completes. Montgomery, who was promoted to Global Head of Real Estate at Schroders two years ago, will support Lowe, who oversees £2.5bn of UK properties, for as long as necessary to ensure a smooth transition. Bradley Biggins will remain as co-manager. SREI announced it was looking for a replacement for Montgomery last year.
Aberdeen European Logistics Income (ASLI) has said it could enter voluntary liquidation by the end of the year following a challenge yesterday by DL Invest, the Polish logistics group that owns an 18% stake and whose attempt to halt the fund’s wind-down and replace Aberdeen Group as manager was rejected by investors in February. ASLI today declared a first interim dividend of 2.34 euro cents (2p) per share and announced plans for a final B-share distribution of €31.7m (£27.2m) worth 6.6p per share following cancellation of its capital redemption reserve. Since shareholders voted to put the company into managed wind-down in July 2024, ASLI says it has returned £242m, or 58.68p per share, to shareholders from B-shares and ordinary dividends. Its last asset at Den Hoorn in the Netherlands is undergoing due diligence by a potential purchaser with a view to completion in the fourth quarter of this year. In an open letter yesterday, DL demanded ASLI’s board provide a timetable for the wind-down and a full account for why it had taken longer than the two years originally planned. It complained that the share price decline in the second quarter had outweighed the 6p per share of capital returned in the period. This raised “serious concerns regarding the effectiveness of the board’s supervision”, it said. ASLI shares rose 0.7p or 3.7% to 19.4p. They have fallen 27% this year as the company has shrunk to a market value of £77m and stand at 17% discount below net asset value.
Real Estate Investors (RLE), the £55m Midlands real estate investment trust, is on track to repay all its debts by the end of the year, paving the way for returns of capital to shareholders as part of its wind-down. In a trading update, chief executive Paul Bassi said the company had resumed marketing properties for sale in April after pausing in response to the Iran war. Although market conditions remained challenging, particularly in Birmingham’s office market, £15.7m of assets had gone under offer of which £10.7m had exchanged or completed at 92% of their December 2025 book value. “We remain open to a corporate transaction that will deliver shareholder value and a more rapid conclusion to our stated strategy,” Bassi added.
Chrysalis (CHRY), the £353m growth capital fund that began a 36-month wind-down earlier this year, has parted ways with Chrysalis Investment Partners, ending the involvement of Richard Watts and Nick Williamson who had run the portfolio since launch in November 2018. Following the completion of the notice period, the management contract with CIP expired yesterday leaving the company self-managed with Sam Dobbyn, the former Urban Exposure boss, the director overseeing a mostly unquoted portfolio whose biggest holding is challenger bank Starling.
