Bank of America Merrill Lynch (BofAML) and Sandell Investment Services have launched the Merrill Lynch Investment Solutions – Castlerigg Equity Event and Arbitrage UCITS Fund.
The sub-fund, which merges Sandell’s Castlerigg Merger Arbitrage UCITS fund onto the Merrill Lynch Investment Solutions (MLIS) alternative UCITS platform, provides institutional investors access to a variety of announced equity event-driven and arbitrage opportunities in developed markets.
The portfolio’s overall objective is to generate consistent net returns that are less dependent on systematic influences than traditional investments.
The Sandell fund was launched in October 2010 and joins the MLIS platform with approximately USD200m in assets under management. Sandell will retain its role as investment manager of the sub-fund, offering access to its equity event and merger arbitrage strategies.
Sandell has a 16-year track record of managing event-driven strategies across equity special situations and credit opportunities. It combines a bottom-up approach with top-down analysis to create a portfolio with low downside volatility.
“Tom Sandell has managed event driven situations across the world since the late 1980s. We look forward to working in partnership with him and his team to provide investors access to a strategy that aims to generate consistent returns which are largely independent of market movements. This latest addition to our award-winning MLIS alternative UCITS platform provides a comprehensive investment solution with a singular focus on global, hard catalyst corporate events,” says Philippe Lopategui, head of the alternative funds platform and global financing solutions at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
Tom Sandell, chief executive officer and portfolio manager at Sandell Asset Management, says: “We are thrilled to complete the merger of our Castlerigg Merger Arbitrage UCITS fund with the MLIS alternative UCITS platform. Philippe and his team have impressed us from the very beginning by pioneering their institutional quality infrastructure back in 2007 while emphasising state-of-the-art technology and risk management at an extremely competitive cost structure. Our outlook for hard catalyst corporate events across the developed markets universe is robust, and we believe there is an abundant set of opportunities to choose from to meet our targeted return objectives.”
The sub-fund is a regulated, Luxembourg onshore vehicle, available for investors through the UCITS framework of rigorous risk, diversification, counterparty exposure, liquidity and eligible asset constraints.
The sub-fund is available for sale in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, Portugal, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the UK.
