Jupiter investors accelerate exodus over departure of star stock-picker

London funds house Jupiter saw outflows accelerate in the first six months of the year as investors grew nervous over the departure of star stock picker Ben Whitmore.

In its half year report today, the FTSE 250 investment group said it had notched total net outflows of £3.4bn in the six months to the end of June, up from £2.2bn at the end of last year.

The acceleration of cash away from its funds dragged its total assets under management below analysts’ expectations to £51.3bn. Analysts had expected assets under management to drop to £51.8bn, or a 1.4 per cent decline from last year.

Pre-tax profits meanwhile rose 11 per cent per cent to £38.7m.

“Jupiter delivered a solid financial performance during the first half of the year consistent with our expectations despite experiencing outflows, which were nearly all associated with changes in the Value team and to the management of the Chrysalis Investment Trust,” Matthew Beesley, chief executive officer, said.

Jupiter has struggled to keep its head above water since revealing earlier this year star fund manager Whitmore would be leaving the firm, which sent its stock price crashing almost 15 per cent in a single day.

The asset manager’s stock price fell to record lows as a result, and even after recovering slightly, is still down 78 per cent over the last five years.

Whitmore’s departure was just the final straw in a long line of poor performance for the company.

Nevertheless, Jupiter notched significant outflows in the first quarter after the loss of Whitmore and the separation of Chrysalis from the company around the same time.

In the run-up to the results, analysts had been expecting a drop in profitability due to the ongoing decline in assets under management, with an expected adjusted profit before tax of £70.8m.

Peel Hunt analyst Stuart Duncan said that he had originally been “optimistic” that Jupiter may be “approaching an inflection point” as outflows finally began to slow, but the departure of Whitmore and Chrysalis had added a new negative factor to the mix.

“There needs to be a clear reversal in earnings momentum for the shares to start being re-rated, in our view,” Duncan added.