Private companies
Controlling and significant minority positions in established British businesses. We look for profitable trading history, an owner who wants to stay involved, and a reason we are a better holder than the next buyer.
Four areas. Nothing outside them.
We stay inside what we understand well enough to price. The list has not changed much since 2007, and we would rather miss an opportunity than take a position we cannot underwrite ourselves.
Property
Freehold and long leasehold in London and the South East, held for income rather than for a resale date.
Secured credit
We lend our own capital against real assets, on terms we write and security we take ourselves. This is where we tend to be useful when a situation needs certainty faster than a bank committee can produce it. We do not lend to consumers and we do not broker other people's loans.
Listed holdings
A concentrated book of listed positions, held as liquidity and as somewhere to keep capital while we wait for the right private opportunity.
How we hold
The holding period is the strategy.
We buy to keep
Nothing we own has a scheduled exit. Positions are reviewed on whether they still earn their place on the balance sheet, not against a fund's remaining life.
We stay out of the way
Where we hold a minority, we do not install our own management or rebuild the reporting. We ask for accounts we can trust and a board seat where it is warranted.
We concentrate
A small number of positions we know properly beats a long list we know a little. Diversification for its own sake tends to mean owning things nobody is watching.
Somewhere in one of those four?
Send us the detail. If it sits outside what we do, we will tell you straight away rather than keep you waiting.