Miton UK Micro confirms wind-up plans

Board offers shareholders cash exit or rollover into open-ended fund.

Miton UK Micro Cap (MINI ), the smaller companies investment trust run by veteran stock pickers Gervais Williams and Martin Turner, is going ahead with plans to wind-up the portfolio.

Shareholders will be offered the opportunity to roll over their holding into the open-ended Premier Miton UK Smaller Companies , which has £45.3m in assets, or they can receive a cash exit. The fund is also managed by Williams and Turner.

The board reiterated its view that it is in the best interests of shareholders to wind up the trust.

Ashe Windham, chair of the trust, acknowledged the portfolio had been through a challenging period following a major redemption last year.

With net assets of just £24m, according to Deutsche Numis, the trust is now of a size that many investors consider too small from a liquidity perspective.

Over the past three years, Miton UK Micro Cap shareholders are down 46.4%, which compares to an 11.3% loss by the average trust in the AIC’s UK smaller companies sector. Miton UK Micro Cap currently trades on an 11% discount to net asset value (NAV).

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