Asset Value Investors has confirmed this week that Nick Greenwood will join AVI to co-manage the MIGO Opportunities Trust [LON:MIGO] and WS AVI Worldwide Opportunities Fund with effect from 18 December 2023.
The Worldwide Opportunities Fund, with c. £43m in assets will be moving to AVI with the portfolio manager, Greenwood. The fund invests globally and looks to take advantage of the closed ended market to purchase investments whose share price is at a significant discount to its underlying value.
AWO invests primarily in collective investment schemes such as investment trusts and OEICS. The fund aims to provide capital growth over the long-term, being five years or more.
The fund selects investments from a diversified range of global themes, whilst benefiting from the market inefficiencies commonly found in the closed ended sector. There tends to be what the manager calls “an instinctively contrarian approach”, aiming to profit from the cycle of investor sentiment and catalysts for change in the market. Occasionally, the fund will invest in funds which are not trading on a discount.
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Greenwood has managed the fund since launch
Greenwood has managed the UK OEIC since launch in 2003 with an average annual performance over the period of 8.6%.
The listed MIGO trust is currently neutral for the last 12 months, butt returned 30% over three years.
This follows the recent announcement that AVI has been appointed as investment manager of the MIGO Opportunities Trust plc and the appointment of Charlotte Cuthbertson as co-portfolio manager. Both Cuthbertson and Greenwood managed the flexible investment trust mandate at Premier Miton, but Cuthbertson made the move first to AWI earlier this month after eight years with Premier Miton.
Greenwood handed in his notice at Premier Miton in March, and the investor community in London was widely anticipating he would also end up at AWI alongside Cuthbertson.
A highly respected investment professional with over two decades of experience, Greenwood ran MIGO since its launch in April 2004 and managed the Premier Miton Worldwide Opportunities Fund for over 20 years.
Greenwood began his career in private client stock broking and was a founder member of Christows stockbroking operation in 1991. He joined the Christows Investment Trust team setting up their London office in 1995 and became lead manager in November 1997.
AVI currently manages AVI Global Trust (£1.1bn), one of the oldest listed investment companies in London, AVI Japan Opportunity Trust (£168m) all listed on the London Stock Exchange. In December, MIGO Opportunities Trust (£76m) will move to AVI.
