Barrenjoey’s sell-side research desk dropped coverage on Platinum Asset Management on Tuesday in the midst of attempts by the fund management group’s newly appointed chief executive, Jeff Peters, to turn around the struggling business.Barrenjoey fired off a note, signed by insurance and diversified financials duo Andrew Adams and Niva Chandrasekaran, saying it would “cease coverage” on Platinum after a “reallocation of “resources”.
Fund managers know there are only a handful of reasons why sell-side analysts yank research coverage on a stock out of the blue. Usually, it’s when a company is no longer big enough or sexy enough to care about – for investors or for bankers. Occasionally, it is just what the boilerplate language implies: a research boffin has actually left.
The irony is Platinum joins rival Magellan Financial Group, which Barrenjoey’s research team hasn’t covered since given the ASX-listed fund manager’s 36 per cent ownership.has co-edited Street Talk since 2009, specialising in private equity, investment banking, M&A and equity capital markets stories. Prior to that, she spent 10 years in London as a markets and M&A reporter at Bloomberg and Dow Jones.is a co-editor of the Street Talk column.