17 Sep 2012 08:00
City of London Group plc ("COLG" or "the Company")
Chairman's Statement to AGM
The following is the text of the statement to be read out by Henry Lafferty, Chairman of City of London Group plc, at the Company's Annual General Meeting at 10.00am today.
"I would like to take this opportunity to update shareholders on our current prospects and ambitions following our Interim Management Statement on 17th August 2012 which highlighted the following major achievements announced so far in this financial year
Highlights
• On 5 April the Company announced Therium Capital Management Ltd was awarded its first institutional mandate for £5m with a stated intention to increase the fund to £15m
• On 7 June the Company announced Trade Finance Partners Ltd agreed a three year £15m facility with Macquarie Bank with the option to increase to £25m by mutual agreement
• On 6 August the Company announced Professions Funding Ltd secured its first institutional mandate for £10m from Crescendo Advisors International Ltd
• On 16 August the Company announced it reached agreement to sell its investment in FX Capital Group Ltd for cash at over 2.5 times its original cost. This results in a profit on sale of £733,000 and fully recovers book value.
In the IMS, we reported strong demand across all platforms for the services and funding provided and strong demand has continued. I can report we are in discussions across each of the platforms to attract further third party funds to satisfy demand and hence bring each platform to profitability.
Our Litigation Funding Platform has seen a particular increase in the volume of cases for potential funding, and we are in advanced discussions with funders for the next stage of the pipeline.
Our Trade Finance and Credit Asset Management Platforms are also experiencing a good level of new clients and interest from funders although the Trade Finance business did experience delays in funding clients as a result of the switch to the new Macquarie banking facility. This and the costs of the transaction will impact the planned results which may leave only marginal profits for the first half for this platform.
We continue to attract new talent to the group within our specialist platforms and we hope to be able to report further platform developments in the coming months.
We maintain our focus on building our core platforms and concluding arrangements to manage further third party funds; whilst continuing to look for new opportunities to grow the Group based on our core strategy of building a quality financial services group centred on specialist financing and alternative fund management."
Henry Lafferty
17 September 2012
This Annual General Meeting Statement may contain certain statements about the future outlook for COLG and its subsidiaries. Although the directors believe their expectations are based on reasonable assumptions, any statements about the future outlook may be influenced by factors that could cause actual outcomes to be materially different. This statement has been drawn up and presented with the purpose of complying with English law. Any liability arising out of or in connection with it will be determined in accordance with English law.
Enquiries:
City of London Group plc | +44 (0) 20 7628 5518 |
Eric Anstee / John Kent |
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Singer Capital Markets | +44 (0) 20 3205 7500 |
Jonny Franklin-Adams / Matt Thomas |
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College Hill | +44 (0) 20 7457 2020 |
Tony Friend / Antonia Coad |
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Notes to Editors
COLG is an investment company, with a wide range of national and international investments. A public company since 1986, COLG has had a full London Stock Exchange listing since August 1996 (LSE symbol CIN).
The Company's strategy is to build a quality Financial Services Group centred on Specialist Financing and Alternative Fund Management. The Company believes there are particular opportunities in the SME and professional services sectors as major national and foreign banks limit new lending to these borrowers. It therefore seeks to identify and exploit product niches and business models in these sectors where they are supported by strong day to day management teams, providing initial equity, working capital and seed funding for those teams.
Since the final quarter of 2009, COLG has developed four specialist financing funds, pledging significant seed funds to Therium Capital Management Limited, a third party Litigation Funder, Credit Asset Management Limited and Professions Funding Limited, which provides asset backed finance and working capital loans to professional practice firms and finally Trade Finance Partners Limited, a trade finance provider to the SME market.
To find out more about COLG's strategy and its businesses please click on the attached link www.cityoflondongroup.com/about.asp