Specialist investment company Liontrust is to acquire Neptune Investment Management Limited, subject to regulatory approval. This will take Liontrust’s AUM to £17 billion. All the Neptune Investment Team will join Liontrust at their London offices.
On completion of the deal, Robin Geffen will step down as Chief Executive Officer of Neptune and concentrate on leading his investment team and managing funds.
Neptune brings long-term performance through its Global, Income, Regional and Emerging Markets funds. The Neptune Income Fund is the best performing fund in the IA UK Equity Income sector over one year to 30 June 2019.
Seven of Neptune’s funds were given the maximum Five Crown ratings from FE on 29 July 2019: Neptune Income, Balanced, Global Alpha, Global Smaller Companies, Global Technology, Latin America and Russia & Greater Russia.
The Neptune Investment Team will be renamed the Liontrust Global Equity Team once the acquisition is completed, expected to be in October, at which point the funds will be rebranded as Liontrust.
Commenting, Liontrust’s Chief Executive John Ions said:
“Neptune is a great acquisition for Liontrust and will enhance our investment proposition in areas where there is strong demand such as Global equities, Equity Income and Emerging Markets equities.
“Robin and the rest of the team at Neptune will be able to focus on managing their funds and not be distracted by other day-to-day aspects of running a business.”
Robin Geffen added:
“It has been an easy decision to agree to sell Neptune to Liontrust.
“Neptune has great fund performance and an attractive investment proposition and will benefit hugely from the sales and marketing team at Liontrust.
“The deal will also enable me to step away from managing the business and focus solely on managing funds and leading my investment team, which is my real passion.
“We believe the environment and culture at Liontrust will enable us to deliver performance for our investors and attract inflows into our funds over the next few years.”
