J.P. Morgan confirms Arch cru asset purchase

J.P. Morgan's Private Equity limited has completed the purchase of a range of assets held by the former Arch cru funds.

The company said in a statement it had bought a range of private equity investments worth $91.9m (£56.5m) from the SPL funds.

"J.P. Morgan Private Equity Limited (JPEL) is pleased to announce the completion of its acquisition of a portfolio of 38 mid-market buyout co-investments in an all share transaction valued at approximately $91.9m from the SPL Funds," the board of J.P. Morgan Private Equity said.

As part of the deal, 44.7m new equity shares in the JPMorgan vehicle, and a further 30.4m zero shares, were listed for trading.

The announcement comes after J.P. Morgan's Guernsey listed closed-ended investment company announced last month it had made an offer for assets held by the Private Equity (PE1) IC cell, as well as from SPL Private Equity (PE2) and SPL Integrated Finance.

The sale should speed up the process of returning cash to shareholders in the Arch cru funds, which are now managed by Spearpoint.

The board of the SPL cells - which held an EGM where the sale was approved last week - said the zeros alone should net the former Arch cru funds £21.3m, a 7% premium above the value they were when issued to the cells.