JPEL buys Arch Cru portfolio for £56.5m

JPEL has bought the portfolio from the Private Equity (PE1) IC, SPL Private Equity (PE2) and SPL Integrated Finance (PE3) vehicles.

J.P. Morgan Private Equity - a Guernsey-based closed-ended fund of funds listed on the London Stock Exchange - paid £36.7m in US$ equity shares issued at its NAV price for the assets.

The remaining £19.8m given to the former Arch Cru vehicles will be in the form of zero shares in the JP Morgan vehicle. The £36.7m of US equity shares is expected to be returned to shareholders via PE1, PE2 and PE3 as a cash lump sum by year end.

The sale should speed up the process of returning cash to shareholders in the Arch Cru funds, which up until now have been managed by Spearpoint.

J.P. Morgan Private Equity's chairman, Trevor Ash, said: "This acquisition is part of JPEL's strategy of continually repositioning its private equity portfolio."

Both boards of directors have approved the sale of the assets, and approval for the deal has been solicited from shareholders.

If the deal goes through, it is understood the Guernsey vehicles will redeem their stakes in the JP Morgan trust over time.

The deal will bring some relief to shareholders who invested a total of about £422m in the troubled Arch Cru funds before they were suspended in March 2009.

This article was first published in unquote's sister publication, Investment Week.

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