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It’s official: Russell Investments for sale
The London Stock Exchange (LSE) announced last Thursday night in London that it planned to put the investment management arm of Russell Investments up for sale, a move that was widely anticipated after it bought the owner of the Russell stock market indices last year.
In June, LSE agree to acquire Russell for US$2.7 billion and said it would conduct a “comprehensive review” of the asset management arm following the sale. On Thursday, it announced it had concluded that a sale of the asset management business in its entirety was the best strategy going forward.
Investor Strategy News reported in December last that the LSE was going down this path after also reporting on other earlier speculation shortly after the original acquisition announcement. US publisher Asset International reported in November that LSE was canvassing buyers and that the most likely would be a big European-based manager or a US private equity firm.
Separate sales of the asset consulting arm, funds management arm and, possibly, the transactions arm were mooted over the past six months but in recent years asset management had become more closely integrated with consulting in most jurisdictions except the US and UK.
The LSE “has already received a number of expressions of interest in a potential acquisition of Russell Investment Management reflecting the high quality of its business and market leading positions,” the company said. “A sale process of the business will now commence.”
In acquiring Russell, the exchange said it hoped to expand its intellectual property platform and gain its first foothold in the US, the world’s largest financial services market. LSE already owns the FTSE Group, the operator of indexes including the FTSE 100, which tracks the top 100 stocks traded in London.
Founded in 1936, Russell operates an asset-management business and a stock market indexing business. It is probably best known for the Russell 2000, which tracks small-cap stocks, and about $5.2 trillion in assets are referenced against its US indices, according to the company. The asset management arm has $275.09 billion in assets under management.
