Short positions... new fund to back British start-ups

⬛ The UK’s leading asset managers are working on a proposal to set up a fund to back Britain’s start-ups, says Reuters. A risk-averse attitude among the country’s fund managers has been cited as one of the reasons why companies are fleeing the country (see page 26). Now Nicholas Lyons, a veteran banker and the current lord mayor of London, is reportedly working on proposals to build a £50bn ‘Future Growth Fund’ to back fast-growing tech and biotech firms. Lyons has been canvassing blue-chip asset managers for contributions to the fund, which would be modelled on the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Australian superannuation funds. The goal would be to support firms through the “cliff edge” between being a mature private business and a public enterprise. “At the moment these companies have to follow the money,” says Lyons. “If the money is in North America... they’re going to North America.”

⬛ James Anderson, who helped turn Baillie Gifford into one of the UK’s top fund houses, has come out of retirement to run a new $500m fund focused on innovation, says the Financial Times. The new fund is being seeded by Lingotto Investment Management, part of Exor, the holding company of the Agnelli industrial dynasty. Anderson is being joined by another familiar name for UK investors, former chancellor George Osborne, who is taking over as Lingotto’s chairman. Exor is putting $3bn into Lingotto, along with Covea, the French insurer, and is looking to raise outside capital in the future as it expands. Anderson knows Exor well: while at Baillie Gifford he was a longtime shareholder in some of its companies. The new fund will invest across both private and public markets.