There’s a new name atop of Winterflood’s list of monthly movers in London’s investment company space but which fund has a biotech company to thank for making it into the top five?

ByFrank Buhagiar

The Top Five

JPMorgan Emerging Europe, Middle East & Africa (JEMA)not only makes it back onto Winterflood’s list of biggest monthly movers in the investment company space, but the emerging markets investor takes top spot. The lion’s share of the +35.6% share price gain was made from 11 July 2024 onwards, a period in which there has been no news out from the company apart from a series of net asset value updates. Lack of news hasn’t put off buyers. On the contrary, the volume of shares traded has been steadily rising from 40,000 on 11 July 2024 to 389,000 shares on 18 July 2024. Rising volumes + small market cap of £59m = strong share price gain.

Castelnau Group (CGL) drops one place to second despite increasing its gain on the month to +34.2% from +27.5% previously.Shares in the flexible investor still benefiting from that Net Asset Value update issued on 4 July showing net assets stood at £317.5m as at 28 June 2024, a near one-third increase on the £236m reported as at 31 May 2024. As previously noted, the increase is largely down to a +45.7% jump in the value of funeral operator Dignity which accounts for over 70% of CGL’s total assets. CGL, one of the few funds with a share price that trades at a premium to net assets. Easy to see why.

Downing Strategic Micro-cap (DSM) stays in third but the shares did extend their gain to +29.4% from +20.1% previously. The micro-cap investor, which is in wind-down mode, announced the Payment of Third Special Interim Dividend of 17.5p. That means the fund’s total assets are down to just £5 million. Not much left for Milkwood capital to get its hands on then if the Board’s suspicions are correct and the 28% shareholder is looking to gain control of the company and acquire DSM’s assets on the cheap – as announced on 8 July 2024 Milkwood has requisitioned a general meeting to prevent the Board from declaring any “dividend, return of capital or other distribution on or prior to the Requisitioned General Meeting”.

British & American (BAF), another tiddler to make it into the top five courtesy of a +21.1% share price rise. As with CGL above, the strong performance is down to a jump in the £6million market cap’s net asset value (NAV). On 5 June 2024, the company’s NAV as at 31st May 2024 stood at “not less than 24.8 pence per ordinary share on a fully diluted basis.” Fast forward one month and as per the 8 July 2024 update, NAV had jumped to “not less than 29.7 pence per ordinary share on a fully diluted basis”. A large part of the increase likely down to BAF’sholding in Geron Corporation. Shares in the Nasdaq-listed biotech, which accounts for 28% of BAF’stotal assets, are up +13.5% in July alone. Geronimo!

Tritax EuroBox (BOXE) completes the top five. Shares are up +14.9%, a little off the +15.2% gain reported previously. The share price still buoyed by BOXE’s 1 July announcement that revealed the European logistics real estate trust “is in discussions with a number of parties from whom it has received and/or solicited expressions of interest regarding a possible offer for the Company.” One of these is Brookfield Asset Management. As for the names of the rest, perhaps we’ll find out soon.

Scottish Mortgage

Scottish Mortgage’s (SMT) share price finished the week ended Friday 19 July 2024 down -1.6% on the month compared to no change the previous week. NAV fared worse after extending its monthly loss to -3.3% from -0.9% previously. Turns out it was a tough week for global investment trusts as a whole – the sector finished the week down -0.8% having been up +3.4% seven days earlier. With the Nasdaq off 3.6% over the course of the week, SMT was always likely to find the going tough.