James Carthew: Let’s cure, not kill, the UK’s growth capital trusts
Wind-downs and restructurings are hitting the UK’s growth capital trusts but we need these vehicles to support innovators.
I did a tidying up exercise on my portfolio early last month and turfed out a couple of small positions including Digital 9 Infrastructure (DGI9) and Syncona (SYNC).
The DGI9 sale worked out well in that it came before the latest disaster, writing off its holding in TV broadcast tower business Arqiva, which it paid £460m for in June 2022, on the back of claims of inflation-linked revenues and an average eight-year contract duration. However, the loss avoided is rather dwarfed by the loss I had already suffered.
I still think that there is upside in SYNC, but I also owned much more meaningful positions in Worldwide Healthcare (WWH), International Biotechnology (IBT) and RTW Biotech Opportunities (RTW). While I think the outlook for healthcare is pretty positive, three holdings are plenty.
The main difference between SYNC and most of its peers is its bias to early-stage unquoted businesses, although RTW has some overlap here. SYNC has had some spectacular successes. However… read more here