The institutional investor selling down its stake in VPC Specialty Lending

One of the largest backers of the investment trust at its launch, appears to be quietly reducing its stake.

One of the largest backers of the alternative credit investment trust at its launch appears to be quietly reducing its stake.

Old Mutual, a sigificant shareholder in the £351m VPC Specialty Lending fund, has further reduced its holding in the closed ended portfolio following previous reductions in exposure earlier in the year.  

The firm, which encompasses the broader Old Mutual Group as well as Old Mutual Wealth, was third largest share holder in the fund when it launched back in 2015.

Its holding in the fund fell below 6 per cent back in March 2017, now it has sold more shares with its stake now less than 4.99 per cent, according to regulatory filings. 

TheVPC Speciality Lending investment trust is the second largest portfolio offering investors exposure to the nascent market for online lending and alternative credit, a fast growing segment of the private debt world. This follows a fairly torrid period of performance for the trust that prompted a double digit discount in its Net asset Value and subsequently a share buy-back policy.

The managers of the fund have been moving into greater balance sheet exposure in recent months aswell instead of loans from p2p and marketplace lending platforms. Richard Levy, a director of the nvestment trust, has also recently increased his holding in the fund.

Levy is founder and CEO of the trust’s investment manager Victory Park Capital as well as a board member of the fund. He bought 71,916 shares at an average price of £0.8275, totalling £59,510 on June 7^th.

Its numbers for May show performance was impacted by losses from Avant and Prosper. Avant Securitisations were responsible for a -0.66 per cent hit and equity positions in platforms -0.32 per cent, particularly New York listed Elevate whose share price fell 15.2 per cent in May.