IAWS shares snapped up in US as Irish managers keep stakes small

CURRENT ACCOUNT: IAWS had admitted candidly that liquidity was a problem when it came to marketing the shares to overseas investors who also want the flexibility to buy and sell in size. The individual co-ops who received the shares from the society have tended to be slow sellers and it is a strong indication of the value attached to the IAWS shares that, of the 12 million shares spun-out by the society six years ago, more than five million are still owned by the individual co-ops.

Boston investment house Fidelity has certainly taken to foods group IAWS - it has emerged that Fidelity's stake in IAWS has risen from 10 per cent to 11.6 per cent after last week's placing of shares held by the IAWS co-op society, the largest shareholder in IAWS plc.

That makes Fidelity by far the biggest institutional shareholder in the plc, with nobody else even above the 3 per cent disclosure threshold.

The society's stake in IAWS has also been dramatically reduced from more than 40 per cent to 22 per cent, partly through the placing of 3.5 million shares but also through the spin-out of 19 million shares to the co-ops that own the society.

There had been speculation that after last months's rule change, which allowed the society take its stake in the plc to below 30 per cent, it might gradually reduce its stake by a series of spin-outs to society members. Instead, the society decided to do something of a "big bang" with its shareholding, in a move that dramatically increases both the institutional component on the share register and the liquidity in the shares.

There is no reason to believe that the 13.5 million shares retained by the co-ops after last week's spin-out and placing will be treated any differently. At worst, some of those shares will trickle their way onto the market in the years ahead as various co-ops capitalise their gains but a large proportion of those shares are likely to be still held by the co-ops in five years time.

IAWS's international profile has dramatically increased in recent years and, in the past couple of years, its profile in North America has been boosted by the joint venture with the Wendys-owned Tim Hortons restaurant chain.

Last week's placing means that another 7 per cent of the equity is now held by European and US institutions.

Current Account is well aware of the asset reallocation argument that has gone with the introduction of the euro - no need to balance Irish assets against Irish liabilities blah blah!

But it is a telling indication of the stock-picking abilities of many Irish institutions that not a single domestic fund manager owns more than 3 per cent of a stock that has more than doubled in value in the past three years!