“An appeaser is someone who feeds a crocodile, hoping he will eat him last”. Winston Churchill
“Our structure is going to be lean, focused, energetic, accountable, aligned and hungry like it was in the beginning”.
Cooper Investors History
I am writing to announce the most significant changes to Cooper Investors, since our founding. For 25 years, Cooper Investors has been a founder backed specialist investment business. We have built the firm around a distinctive investment philosophy, long-term relationships and a commitment to investing alongside our clients.
Over many years we have become a complicated organisation and recognise that recent investment performance in some of our funds has not met the standard we and our investors expect.
The core issues affecting CI’s recent performance can be summarised as too many funds, leading to a dilution of the laser focus our VoF system demands. As Founder/CIO I take responsibility for this, as I have struggled adding value across such a complex organisation.
Our conclusion is that we will be smarter and more agile investors by doing fewer things, with greater focus and accountability. We are now returning to our origins and back to basics.
We will restructure and simplify the business by concentrating our time and the firm’s investment resources around the idea of one fund, the Brunswick Fund. Our domestic and global investment activities will be consolidated under the Brunswick team.
The Brunswick Fund will have a new leadership team supported by myself, and Andrew Swan; Founding Executive Director and two exceptionally talented investors that I have loved working with over the last 12+ years, Geoff Di Felice and Marcus Guzzardi. Geoff and Marcus bring extensive domestic and international research and investment experience, together with long-standing relationships across global and domestic investment markets, and a deep understanding of our investment philosophy and process. Their performance over the last decade plus has been exemplary.
Justin O’Brien, Portfolio Manager, and Stuart McLachlan, Deputy Portfolio Manager, of the Brunswick Fund will be leaving Cooper Investors. We sincerely thank Justin and Stuart for their contribution to Cooper Investors and wish them well for the future. Other funds and people will be impacted as part of this restructure. I hope you can respect this is a sensitive and challenging time for many at CI, and we will communicate more detail about these changes in due course.
The Cooper Family Office, as the majority owner of Cooper Investors, fully supports this decision and will remain a substantial investor in the Brunswick Fund. Furthermore, the Cooper Family Office will be taking a much stronger role in the governance of CI to ensure the performance and risk goals are delivered.
The Cooper Family Office will be materially increasing its holding in the Brunswick Fund as its main investment vehicle into public market opportunities. Aligned clients invested in other CI Funds will be offered the option to invest or roll into the Brunswick Fund.
I believe a simpler, more focused structure, the experience within our team and a renewed commitment to the CI Way gives us the right foundation for the next chapter. We are coming home to be more focused and more intentional than ever.
We will keep you informed as these changes are implemented and will communicate regularly about the Brunswick Fund and other funds, our investment process and our progress.
If you have questions about the changes announced today, please write to me [email protected] or contact Adrian Martuccio [email protected]
Thank you for your continued support and, particularly, for the trust you have placed in myself and in Cooper Investors over many years.