Hg Capital’s results for 2014 show a 12.8% return on net assets and a 9.6% return on share price – well ahead of the 1.2% return on the FTSE All-Share Index. the final dividend is being increased from 29p to 32p to take the full year dividend to 51p (including a 19p special dividend).
£83m of investments were sold. The largest of these was Visma which returned a total of £41.4m to the Trust at an investment multiple of 5.2x original cost. In addition to this, the IPO of Manx Telecom returned £13.1m at a multiple of 2.1x original cost, and the exit of Schleich returned a further £11.9m, at an investment multiple of 2.6x. The sale of Voyage Care and Americana were also completed in 2014. Total realisations over the course of 2014 were made at an aggregate uplift to book value (as at 31 December 2013) of £15.9m. Part of the Visma money came back to shareholders as the special dividend and part was reinvested in the company that acquired it.
£87m was invested in the year, £63m into five new buyouts.
HGT : Hg Capital boosted by Visma sale