In QuotedData’s morning briefing 19 February 2025: Brown Advisory US Smaller Companies (BASC) announced a 5.3% uplift in NAV to 1,550.0p over the six months ended 31 December 2024, while its share price increased 9.2% to 1,400.0p – closing its discount to NAV to 9.7%. The performance lagged its benchmark – the Sterling-adjusted Russell 2000 […]
Foresight Solar’s board said that it was considering a range of strategic options to deliver value to shareholders, having engaged with shareholders. This follows investors voting against its discontinuation back in June where 24.4% voted for the discontinuation of the fund. The board said that some have expressed a desire for liquidity, while others were […]
In QuotedData’s morning briefing 18 February 2025: The board of Assura (AGR) has responded to the announcements yesterday from KKR and USS about the proposal to buy the company. It said that it considered the proposal carefully with its advisers and concluded that it materially undervalued the company and its prospects and therefore rejected it […]
Assura has rejected a bid for the company from a consortium comprising Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) and US private equity giant KKR valuing it at £1.562bn. USS and KKR have submitted four indicative non-binding proposals to the Assura board regarding a possible cash offer for the company – the most recent at 48.0p per share, […]
In QuotedData’s morning briefing 17 February 2025: Fair Oaks Income (FAIR) is returning $4.5m to holders of its realisation shares on 28 February 2025 by way of a compulsory partial redemption of realisation shares. This sixth redemption since the share class was created will be effected at 56.58 US cents per share (NAV as at […]
Investors’ most enduring love affair over the past decade has been with mega-cap technology stocks. They have swooned as the sector has gone from strength to strength, pushing more and more capital in its direction. However, there is a growing question as to whether this romantic entanglement is nearing its natural end. Until recently, the […]
At today’s meeting of Edinburgh Worldwide shareholders that was requisitioned by Saba Capital, Saba’s proposals were overwhelmingly rejected by 63.8% to 36.2%. The turnout at the meeting was 64.7%. Edinburgh Worldwide’s chair Jonathan Simpson-Dent said: “Edinburgh Worldwide’s shareholders have spoken: they have rejected Saba Capital’s proposal for a fundamentally different strategy based on fundamentally different […]
The board of Jupiter Green Investment Trust has proposed liquidating the company and giving shareholders the option to roll their investment into units in Jupiter Ecology Fund (Ecology), a Jupiter open-ended fund, or receiving an uncapped cash exit equal to NAV. Accordingly, the board is putting forward proposals to shareholders for the winding-up of the […]
Phil Kent, Lead Investment Adviser to GCP Infrastructure Investments Ltd Infrastructure is all around us. It’s economic infrastructure, like roads, bridges and airports. It’s social infrastructure such as hospitals and schools. It’s digital infrastructure in the form of communications towers, data centres and networks. And it’s environmental infrastructure, such as offshore wind farms and solar. […]
Saba Capital Management has withdrawn its requisition notice of European Smaller Companies Trust after discussions with the board. The US hedge fund has withdrawn the requisition for a period of 30 days to allow both parties to enter into good-faith negotiations aimed at achieving an outcome that benefits all shareholders. Saba had requisitioned the board, […]
Invesco Asia Trust (IAT) has competed its merger with Asia Dragon Trust (DGN) after Asia Dragon shareholders approved the combination yesterday. Invesco Asia Trust has acquired around £544m of assets from DGN in consideration for the issue of 142,619,864 new shares to DGN shareholders. The number of new shares to be issued was calculated based […]
SEGRO, the largest UK listed property company, has amassed a £1.5bn war chest as it aims to become Europe’s largest data centre operator. In positive full-year results to the end of 2024, the company says that it has built a landbank with access to 2.3GW of potential power in Europe’s key data centre ‘availability zones’ […]
In QuotedData’s morning briefing 14 February 2025: Foresight Environmental Infrastructure (FGEN) posted a 2.2% fall in NAV to 197.4p per share over the quarter to 31 December 2024. After paying the quarterly dividend of 1.95p, the NAV total return for the period was -0.34%. Portfolio performance was below forecast primarily due to a period of […]
Henderson Opportunities results for the 12 months ended 31 October 2024 are out. The NAV return was 17.1%, ahead of the All-Share which returned 16.3%. The narrowing discount, achieved ahead of the announcement of the board’s plan to offer a cash exit or a rollover into an open-ended vehicle, meant that the share price return […]
Scottish American (SAIN) has published results covering the 12 months ended 31 December 2024. It was not a good year for the trust, with an NAV total return of 6.1% significantly lagging the market’s return of 19.8%. A widening discount made the share price total return even worse, ending the year at -4.2%. The company […]
In a lettings update, Urban Logistics REIT has announced that it completed new lettings on five units, totalling 301,000 sq ft of space and £3.0m of annual rent, since 30 September 2024. Two of the lettings were on assets acquired in September 2024 for a total new headline rent of £1.3m per annum and a […]
Brunner has published results covering the 12 month period ended 30 November 2024. The NAV return for the period was 17.9%, underperforming its benchmark (70% FTSE World Ex. UK / 30% FTSE All-Share), which returned 23.6%. However, a strongly narrowing discount meant that the share price return was 39.3%. Addressing this underperformance, the managers said: “Most […]
In QuotedData’s morning briefing 13 February 2025: AVI Japan Opportunity (AJOT) says that Andrew Rose and Thomas (Tom) Yoritaka have joined its board as new non-executive directors. Andrew is a Japanese speaker with over 38 years’ experience specialising in Japanese equities and held various senior roles at Schroder Investment Management, where he spent 11 years […]
CQS Natural Resources Growth and Income (CYN) has confirmed that it has received a second notice from Saba Capital Management demanding another general meeting of shareholders. Once again, shareholders will incur the cost of defending against this attack by Saba (which CYN’s board says is without merit) that was launched without any prior engagement from […]
Ruffer Investment Company (RICA) says that Duncan MacInnes, co-manager of the fund, has left its manager with immediate effect and so, as of today, Alexander Chartres – a partner at Ruffer LLP – and Ian Rees will join the current portfolio manager Jasmine Yeo as managers of RICA’s portfolio. Jasmine has been co-manager of RICA […]
Following its announcement on 20 March 2024 that Jonathan Simon, one of its large cap portfolio managers responsible for value stocks, would retire in early 2025, JPMorgan American (JAM) says that it has now been advised that Mr Simon’s retirement will be effective 3rd March 2025. Following Jonathan’s retirement, Graham Spence will join Jack Caffery […]
In QuotedData’s morning briefing 12 February 2025 Asia Dragon (DGN) has announced the results of the elections for its combination with Invesco Asia Trust (IAT): 30.92% of shares opted for the rollover option while 69.08% of shares opted for the cash option, which was limited to 25% of the shares in issue (less shares held […]
Funds managed by Goldman Sachs Alternatives have bought a majority stake in Trackunit from funds advised by Hg and GRO Capital. Trackunit’s solutions connect construction equipment to the cloud, serving equipment manufacturers, rental companies, contractors and ecosystem tech partners, and integrating the off-highway vehicle, connected site, and mobile workforce. Trackunit serves a global diversified customer […]
Brown Advisory has agreed to a reduced tiered management fee replacing the current fee arrangements on Brown Advisory US Smaller Companies. This is effective from and backdated to 1 January 2025. The management fee will be calculated based on the lower of capitalisation and NAV, rather than NAV as is currently the case; and the […]
In QuotedData’s morning briefing 11 February 2025: CT Managed Portfolio Trust (CMPG / CMPI) has a new two-year unsecured revolving credit facility with The Royal Bank of Scotland International Limited (London Branch) for £10m. This replaces a £5m unsecured term loan which had a fixed interest rate of 2.78% and a £5m unsecured revolving credit […]
Here we go again – Saba published a press release this afternoon. [Despite its embarrassing failure to seize control of a number of trusts, Saba doesn’t seem to have got the message that shareholders in these trusts quite like what they have and are not looking for change. In the press release below, Saba claims […]
Keystone Positive Change (KPC) has announced that it is relaunching its plans to liquidate the trust – offering shareholders the option of a cash exit at a 1% discount to the residual NAV or the opportunity to rollover into the Baillie Gifford Positive Change Fund (click here to see our coverage of the original proposals), […]
In QuotedData’s morning briefing 10 February 2025: Baker Steel Resources Trust (BSRT) has published a portfolio update and its NAV as at 31 January 2025 (89.1p per share), a decrease of 0.6% from the last published NAV at 31 December 2024, largely due to falls in the share prices of Tungsten West Plc and Metals […]
HMS Investment Trust is facing turbulent waters. Not only are the sharks circling, but the icebergs are proliferating, while the regulator seems determined to put a hole in us below the waterline. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) recently hosted an open panel for industry members, focusing on a critical issue: the fate of the sector […]
European Opportunities Trust (EOT) has released its interim results for the six months to 30 November 2024. During the period, EOT provided NAV and share price total returns of -8.4% and -10.6% respectively, compared with a total return of -3.3% for its benchmark, the MSCI Europe Total Return Index (all in sterling terms). EOT’s chair, […]
