Witan hands £120m Europe mandate to Marathon

The Witan investment trust has handed a £120m pan-European mandate to Marathon Asset Management.

The appointment combines part of Marathon's existing UK-only mandate with the Europe ex-UK portfolio previously managed by Wellington Management.

Varenne Capital Partners, Witan's other pan-European manager, will continue to manage a smaller private equity-style portfolio, with further European exposure achieved via three global managers.

The £979m trust's managers have also increased the use of derivatives, employing index futures to enhance its equity exposure since early June.

"The backdrop to these changes is that the multi-manager approach adopted by Witan in 2004 has been showing encouraging signs of success, both in positive and negative market phases," Witan CEO Andrew Bell says.

"The company's performance has been improving, both relative to its own and other commonly-used global equity benchmarks and within the Global Growth peer group.

"Marathon is a well established manager of European equities with an outstanding track record.

"By broadening their mandate we have increased their universe of stocks and therefore their scope to find the best companies in sectors that meet their capital cycle investment strategy."