Cru founder Maguire closes chippy

Cru founder Jon Maguire has closed the Bristol-based fish and chip shop he bought after the Arch cru fund he marketed collapsed.

Maguire's in Kingswood, previously the Clocktower, has been closed until further notice, according to local paper the Kingswood People. Staff are reportedly saying the business suffered from a lack of custom.

Questions have been raised over how Maguire was able to buy the chippy, after claiming he had lost everything when the Arch cru fund range was suspended in March 2009.

However, IFAonline revealed Maguire cashed in his £150,000 investment in Arch cru just 14 weeks before the fund range was suspended due to liquidity problems, and while his firm was still promoting the troubled fund to other investors. The suspension left investors unable to sell out of their holdings.

Today, J.P.Morgan Private Equity Limited announced it has moved to snap up some of the assets from the former Arch cru portfolios in a deal worth £56.5m.

It is buying assets from 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 cru fund range of six unit trusts -CF Arch cru Finance, Income, Balanced, Global Growth, Specialist and Investment - held assets that at one time were valued at £425m.

But in December 2009 estimates for the net asset values of the underlying cells showed a loss of £140m between 13 March 2009, when the range was suspended, and 30 September 30 2009. Individual funds lost between 20% and 40% over this period.

cru Investment Management, established in 2006 by Maguire, marketed the range. It was entitled to a cut of the funds' annual management charge as distributor, thought to be 0.9%. cru entered voluntary insolvency in March 2010.

Maguire could not be reached for comment.