Shareholder Comments / Views
"Other than being a satisfied long term investor with Amati I
have absolutely no association whatsoever with the Company, its staff or
Directors. I invested in what was First State AIM VCT at its inception
some 20 years ago and have continued to hold a relatively high percentage of my
overall investment portfolio in it. Why? Two primary reasons: I am satisfied
with the performance of the VCT and with the investment managers’
communications of their thoughts on the portfolio and market views generally.
Put simply I have confidence in their ability and it is clear to me their views
align very well with mine. I will only ever invest my money where I have
confidence the managers are on the same wave length as myself and in Amati I
have that confidence. That the Board under Wollocombe launched a review of the VCT
I have no problem with; indeed such reviews can be beneficial. The Board
however performed a cardinal sin in changing strategy and fund manager without
seeking the approval of the people who they are supposedly working for, i.e.
shareholders like me. These actions are disgusting and disgraceful and I will
not tolerate such behaviour. The change of investment strategy demonstrates contempt of
the shareholders. I, and indeed probably all the shareholders, chose to invest
in the VCT because we wanted a fund that was focused on AIM stocks. This change
of strategy is akin to a waiter taking an order in a restaurant, ignoring it
and serving a completely different meal. No waiter is going to keep their job
for very long like that. I sincerely hope Dr Jourdan et al are appointed as Directors
at the forthcoming meeting in place of the self serving incumbents. The vast
majority of my holding has already been sold since the management change. The
remaining shares I hold under the five year rule will also be sold when the
time comes should Maven remain as managers."
Peter Brownless (Shareholder)
"The action being taken by the members of the Maven
Renovar VCT board is quite extraordinary given the results of the General Meeting. There
will no doubt be significant costs and expenses, such as lawyers’ fees as a
consequence of their actions. If they do not succeed, I assume that the
individual directors will be responsible and accountable for such costs,
because they are certainly not being incurred on behalf of the majority of
shareholders and are clearly not in the interests of shareholders."
Christopher Keljik (Shareholder)
Julian Avery (Shareholder and former chairman of Amati VCT 2)
Sidney Cox (Shareholder)
Julian Avery (Shareholder and former chairman of Amati VCT 2)
Peter Lawrence (former Director and Chairman of Amati AIM VCT Board & Shareholder)
"I was a director of Amati AIM VCT from its inception until 2018 and have been a shareholder throughout its life. I have great respect for Paul Jourdan and his team and see no need for the change of manager. The change of policy was in my view brought in arbitrarily and without shareholder approval. Like many others I hold investments in generalist VCTs as well as Amati and an AIM VCT is a deliberate part of my asset spread. For those of us who have held our shares for more than 5 years we are in effect being asked to switch into a completely new investment and if we were minded to do so we could sell the Amati holding and reinvest in a different VCT of our own choosing and get a 30% tax rebate for doing so. The change proposed seems to me to have no merit."
Charlie Pinney (former Director of Amati VCT Board & Shareholder)
"I am disappointed that there was no consultation
with shareholders prior to the change of Manager taking place.
It's difficult to have confidence in any Board where directors do not show
faith in the Company by holding a reasonable number of shares in the
entity. I certainly do not want to end up holding a vehicle
investing in unquoted shares".
Angus Tulloch (former Fund Manager at Stewart Investors & Shareholder)
"In my view, the current board lost any credibility they may have had by unilaterally deciding to move the management and change the investment strategy of the VCT without seeking shareholder approval.
Craig Yeaman (Fund Manager & Shareholder)
Andrew Lidsey, Chartered FCSI IMC (Partner at Albert E Sharp & Shareholder)
"I invested in the Amati Aim VCT as part of a strategy to balance my investment portfolios. It was the AIM dimension that was of particular interest. Therefore the fact that the Board of the newly appointed Maven Renovar VCT decided unilaterally to change the investment strategy to include non-AIM investments is unacceptable to me. I have not received any communication from the Board and they have not attempted to explain or justify their new strategy. Their lack of engagement with existing investors is the reason I am voting to replace the Board with individuals who will take account of what the investor base signed up for and act in their best interests. I support the strategy that will see the value of the existing AIM-based investment portfolio systematically enhanced and realised over time so that all investors get their money back in a tax efficient manner."
Steve Smith (Shareholder)
Christian Hobart (Shareholder)
"As one of the largest shareholders of the VCT, I fully support the Amati proposal. All surplus cash must be immediately returned to shareholders, along with all proceeds from all future disposals. I sincerely hope the old Board accept their fate and immediately ensure a smooth and professional handover to the new Board, without delay or obstinance."
Sean Lindsay (Shareholder)
"The current Board has lost credibility. The way forwards needs to be tested by a member's vote at a General Meeting"
Mark Clenshaw (Shareholder)
"I think what the previous Board did in overturning the investment mandate represents a shocking and undemocratic coup on shareholders. Many of us have been dedicated and long-term holders of our Amati Aim VCT shares and appreciated the work of the investment managers, in particular Paul Jourdan. I understand the ups and downs of the AIM market and see the possibility of good returns going forward with the existing investments. I would like to see the existing team continue managing the current investments.”
John M Baker, B.Com, CAIB (SA) (Shareholder)
"The previous Board changed the manager, and wanted to change the
investment strategy. Those are big changes, where shareholders should have been
consulted. Instead they were presented with a fait accompli. As a shareholder
I was opposed to both decisions, for good reasons. The former, because I knew
and understood the investment process used by Amati. Despite the performance
issues I would rather be invested in something that I understand than forced to
go to something new that I do not understand. The latter, because particularly
in the current environment I do not want exposure to unquoted investments.
Increased unquoted investments is a concern for two important reasons. The
obvious worry is increased liquidity risks. The less obvious is a failure to recognise
that a large percentage of the shareholder capital base has now passed that
critical holding period. I'm sure many will remember the LF Woodford Equity
Income fund which got into problems when a large number of the shareholders
wanted to withdraw their money. I really don't want to discover that my funds
are caught up in a similar situation. "
Gordon Izatt (Shareholder)
"I am a long-term shareholder of Amati AIM VCT, now
renamed Maven Renovar VCT. It is very obvious that being invested in the UK AIM
market through any general market VCT vehicle has been a strategic mistake on
my part. With the exception of short-lived Liz Truss administration's brief
attempts, there has not been a UK government which would put ambition,
entrepreneurship, wealth creation and prosperity as something worth celebrating
and encouraging for a very long time. Instead, successive governments have
undermined the UK's strengths through ideologically driven decisions lacking
economic sense or strategy, all seemingly to achieve illusionary equality
by pushing everyone down rather than aspiring to encourage people to raise up.
The current economical malaise under the socialist government cannot be a
surprise for anyone with at least a rudimentary knowledge of history. However,
it is merely a culmination of this long-term economical mismanagement across
the Tory-Labour governments. The board of Maven Renovar VCT rightly points out that
the absolute performance of the trust over last 3 years has been
unsatisfactory. The former fund manager Paul Jourdan has acknowledged himself
in one of his presentations that most of the investments made at the height of
the Covid hysteria and madness were significantly overvalued and the
shareholders are unlikely to ever see an acceptable return from these. As much
as I am very glad he made this self-reflection, this does not of course make
the losses any easier. It is clear mistakes have been made -- by fund manager in
deploying fresh cash and possibly not exiting investments when they became
substantially overvalued as well as by investors such as myself -- both in
terms of investing in the UK AIM given the political background as well as in
terms of timing, deploying fresh cash during what can now, with the benefit of
hindsight, can be seen as a bubble. Being upfront about these I believe
provides a basis for a way forward. Bearing all this in mind, I diverge from sentiments
expressed by the current board and their decisions on two fronts. Namely, a) Change of trust mandate: The board’s decision to
shift the trust’s mandate from the AIM market to a blend of AIM and private
unlisted companies without genuine shareholder consent is unacceptable. This
change incurred significant costs, including termination fees to Amati and rebranding
expenses, without adequate shareholder consultation. Only after implementing
these changes did the board seek shareholders’ approval, not through a genuine
vote but as a formality for an already finalized decision. If I choose to
invest into private companies through a VCT, there are a plethora of existing
VCT vehicles regularly seeking injections of fresh capital. In all these cases
I will get upfront 30% discount for the extra risks the UK government
recognises. If the board and Maven think they can provide a unique
differentiator to the market offerings by their take on a mixed AIM/private
companies VCT, nothing stops them from setting this vehicle up, finding a
funding for marketing such a vehicle and attracting a new capital. Market will
decide if this offering is attractive. However, it appears the board and Maven
have misused existing shareholder capital to fund this venture. As a
shareholder, I strongly object to the board using my capital in this manner. b) Treatment of previous Manager: I find it insulting to
Paul Jourdan to be smeared by one of the current board members as a man 'with
such a dismal recent track record', claim based on measuring his performance
over a selective and ex-post selected time period roughly from the peak of the
AIM market to its bottom. Even in Warren Buffett's stellar career you can
selectively choose short periods of time during which the absolute performance
was unsatisfactory. This selective framing undermines the board’s credibility.
However unsatisfactory the performance has been since the peak of the Covid
bubble, the truth is any generalist AIM investment vehicle did very poorly and
in fact comparably so. The only strategies on AIM which offered good returns
over this period were ones which invested to a highly concentrated portfolio in
a selected few highly niche sectors -- most of these types of companies were
not seeking new funding as they were highly cash generative and could not in my
knowledge qualify for VCT investment in the first place. When the performance
of Amati AIM VCT is taken over 10+ years, it comfortably beat the AIM market.
Moreover, in my experience the manager as well the whole team around him have
behaved with personal integrity and were transparent in communicating with
shareholders. I respected the decision of effectively closing the trust
for new investments over the last 3 years in order not to dilute the existing
shareholders during the period of depressed prices and absence of attractively
priced qualifying opportunities based on the judgement of Amati AIM VCT
managers. I also very welcomed the return of much of the excess capital within
the trust in a form of a series of special dividends. To me, this indicates
both respect to shareholder capital and also recognising that the shareholders
themselves are best placed to decide how they wish to deploy this capital most
effectively next. Going forward, I personally believe that a gradual
wind-down of the trust over the period of 2-3 years, by means of exiting
holdings where on risk-reward basis there is not much upside whilst holding to
selected few promising ones, and paying the proceeds as irregular special
dividends is the best way forward. If AIM opportunities with unusually
attractive risk-reward potential emerge during this time, I support capital
being deployed there. However, I am against deployment of capital in the name
of having to deploy the capital somewhere. I believe it should be possible to negotiate reduced
management fees for such a mandate in which the management would oversee
existing investments but would no longer be actively researching and new ones,
therefore incurring much reduced overheads. I appreciate some shareholders will want to return some of the capital paid out
by the special dividends back to AIM / UK private VCT markets. Those
shareholders will have opportunity to do so as there are other vehicles
actively seeking new capital, both for private companies and AIM market. If the
current board and Maven decide to create yet another such offering, even better
for the investor choice. They should however do it using their own capital, not
abuse my other existing shareholders' capital for this exercise. It is my understanding that Paul Jourdan proposes a way
forward which is very close to my preferred way. This is the reason why I voted
for removal of the current board and why I support and intend to vote for Paul
Jourdan's recommended way forward unless even more attractive proposal emerges
in the meanwhile."
Dr Pavel Bubak (Shareholder)
"I am not
associated with either Amati or Maven Renovar VCT other than being a
shareholder in Maven Renovar VCT. I have invested in a broad range of
generalist and AIM VCTs and specifically invested in what was then Amati AIM
VCT because of its AIM mandate. I am entirely content to “take the
rough with the smooth” and invested in the Amati AIM VCT for the long term.
Therefore, the fact that the board of the now Maven Renovar VCT decided
unilaterally to change the investment strategy to include non-AIM investments
as well as change the manager to Maven is unacceptable to me. I continue to
hope this can be reversed and the management of the VCT to go back to
Amati. If for any reason this is not possible, I would be much more
interested in receiving cash back from Maven Renovar VCT than further (risky)
investments - and most certainly not in unquoted private companies."
Client of Chelsea FS & Shareholder
Shareholder who wishes to remain anonymous
