Julius Baer Spins Off Artio in $700 M Offering

123jump.com Staff
09 Sep, 2009
New York City

The Swiss private bank Julius Baer plans to spin off its asset management unit Artio Global Investors. The proceeds will be used to repay Julius Baer and two principal shareholders.

[R]9:00 AM New York – The Swiss private bank Julius Baer plans to spin off its asset management unit Artio Global Investors. The proceeds will be used to repay Julius Baer and two principal shareholders.[/R]

Artio Global Investors Inc, the asset management arm of Swiss private bank Julius Baer will be spun off in a public offering. The shares will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol ART.

According to the filed registration statement with the SEC, the investment management company plans to raise as much as $699.6 million through offering of 23.4 million shares. The shares are expected to be priced between $24 and $26 a share.

The company is known for its international equity funds and has successfully raised assets under management from $7.5 billion at the end of 2003 to $53.3 billion at the end of August of this year.

Of the assets under management, 84% are linked to equity strategies and the rest to high yield and global bonds.

The company relies for its distribution of funds on investment intermediaries and has 758,000 individual investors and 1,200 institutional clients.

After the completion of the offering, Julius Baer Holding Ltd will control 35% of voting rights and 47.3% of economic rights, two principal shareholders will own 13% of voting rights and no economic rights and public shareholders will control 39% voting rights and 52.7% economic rights.

The company plans to use $495.6 million of net proceeds to repurchase 21 million shares of class C shares from Julius Baer Holding Ltd and $28.3 million to purchase class A common stock each from Richard Pell and Rudolph-Riad Younes.

Chief Executive Richard Pell will also receive $48.4 million and $22.7 million for profit distributions for 2008 and 2009 and head of international equity Rudolph-Riad Younes will receive $49.3 million and $21.5 million for the profit distribution for 2008 and 2009.

The company will have a total of 60.6 million outstanding shares after the offering.

Revenues increased in 2008 to $422 million $300.4 million in 2006 and net income surged to $61.15 million from $44.77 million in the corresponding years.

Goldman Sachs and BofA Merrill Lynch are lead underwriters for the offering.