Gartmore bids for Irish fund

The Gartmore Group has told the market it intends to make an offer for 40 per cent of the share capital of its Irish equity fund, the Gartmore Irish Growth Fund.

The fund, which has investments in Irish Continental, Kingspan, Abbey, Iona, Bank of Ireland, Kerry and Elan, said the move was in response to a decision by another fund, Jupiter, to sell a 29 per cent stake in Gartmore.

Gartmore shareholders can sell shares as part of the offer at 92 per cent of the market price, Gartmore said.

Shareholders who want to sell shares in the fund can sell them to Credit Lyonnais Securities, which will purchase the shares and then sell them on to the company.

All transactions will be carried out on the London Stock Exchange. The offer is being made to shareholders registered in the Republic or Britain.

The fund has a market capitalisation of £77 million sterling (€113 million).

Mr Gervais Williams of Gartmore, who set up the fund in 1995, said its value had increased by 360 per cent since then.

An extraordinary general meeting will be held on March 9th to decide on the tender offer. The tender offer is for 7.7 million shares, representing 40 per cent of the company's issued share capital.

Mr Williams said the Jupiter decision was not a vote of no confidence in the Irish market. He said the fund had proven to be an excellent investment.

Gartmore said that the "key drivers" for stock market growth in the Republic remained in place.

One driver was high rates of economic growth in the State, and the second was the relatively low rates of corporate tax, which were attractive to inward corporate investors.