F&C agrees to £708m takeover offer

F&C, one of London City’s oldest investment firms, has agreed to an all-cash £708 million takeover from Canadian Bank BMO Global Asset Management.

The firm announced it was in talks with BMO over an acquisition yesterday and has since confirmed that BMO has agreed to pay 120p per share. The offer places a 28% premium on Friday’s closing share price.

Commenting on the announcement, Kieran Poynter, chairman of F&C, said, “F&C’s board of directors believes the offer represents an attractive valuation for F&C shareholders and a positive outcome for employees and clients.”

F&C can trace its roots back to the launch of the Foreign & Colonial Investment trust in 1868. However, in recent years the firm has been hit with increasing client outflows and relatively weak earnings.

Blue & Green Tomorrow’s Voice of the Adviser asked financial advisers which ethical fund providers they used most often. In 2012 25% said they regularly used F&C, however, this fell to 13% in 2013.

The firm’s Stewardship Funds are some of the longest established ethical options available to investors. The asset manager has also been an active proponent of robust corporate governance, ranking first in a 2012 FairPensions (now ShareAction) report looking into responsibility.

Further reading:

Jupiter and F&C poll in top four amongst EIA members F&C updates investment policy to allow unethical sectors FairPensions publishes ethical investment responsibility ranking Ecclesiastical most popular fund provider among EIA members The Guide to Sustainable Investment 2013