James Carthew: Bad structures have robbed investors of potential perks
Overly complex company structures have led trusts to become more vanilla in their design, but they are not without their perks.
EPE Special Opportunities (ESO) was the second-best performing trust over the first half of 2026 behind Baker Steel Resources (BSRT), which I discussed last week, despite its small market capitalisation of just £61m.
Its remarkable 62% share price uplift this year is welcome, but only takes us back to where it was a little over four years ago – and well below its September 2021 peak.
The picture would look a bit rosier had the discount not widened recently to over 50%. It is buying back its shares, but I have never been convinced of the effectiveness of this as a tool for narrowing the discount when a trust is this small and the buybacks are making it steadily less liquid…. read more here