The lives and times of Assirt
Themovement ofAssirtfrom underneath Sealcorp and into St George’s Investment Centre of Excellence (ICE) is not the first move the research house has undertaken in recent years.
In October last year, Assirt rejoined the Sealcorp stable after a stint on its own under the Wealthpoint banner, a name which has since been sold off after the research house was brought back into the fold last year.
But the picture is not as simple as that. In the past three years, Assirt has been teamed up with a number of other businesses, packaged under the Wealthpoint name, spun out and partially sold off before being repurchased by Sealcorp’s parent group St George, and then moved back in alongside Sealcorp before returning to its original home under the Sealcorp banner.
Along the way Wealthpoint was formed through the merger of Assirt, Bourse Data and Hot Copper and was also the name given to an online financial planning tool.
Assirt was then taken back into the fold, Bourse Data was moved into Assirt Equities Research, which was sold last year and is now Aegis Equities, while Hot Copper disappeared in the rubble of the tech wreck leaving Wealthpoint and its systems. This was also sold in late 2002 for an undisclosed sum to Midstreet Technology.
But what makes Assirt’s move in this instance all the more interesting is that throughout the history of the Assirt, Wealthpoint and Sealcorp businesses, despite their time apart they have never really been distant.
Assirt Research was originally owned by Sealcorp, which started the managed funds research house in the late 1980s and held it until September 2000 when it become part of the greater Wealthpoint operation.
At the time, the group was majority-owned by external parties from either Sealcorp or St George, which owned about 8 per cent of the group but maintained options to buy a larger percentage in the future.
This future did not take long to arrive. Eleven months later St George exercised those options and repurchased the remaining 92 per cent of Wealthpoint, returning Assirt back to where it started nearly three years ago, until the decision was made to separate Assirt and move it closer to the investment side of the St George group.
AUTHOR
Jason Spits
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