L&G acquires Cofunds in £131m deal

Legal & General has agreed to acquire the 75% share capital of Cofunds which it does not already own, for a cash consideration of £131m.

This means it has bought out shares from groups including Threadneedle and Jupiter. The ownership of the platform was broken down into: Legal & General 25%; IFDS 24%; Threadneedle 20%; Newhouse Capital Partners 18%; Jupiter 10% and Prudential 3%. Back in 2001, the fund groups united to launch a platform rival to Fidelity-owned FundsNetwork which had entered the UK market, but there have been rumours for many months now that L&G was poised to take total control of the whole of Cofunds. The transaction is expected to complete in H1 2013 and will be financed out of Legal & General's exis...