American biotech firm Prothena, the mega fund manager’s highest conviction holding, lost 15% of it share price value on Tuesday, falling to $44.60, its lowest level this year. Over the last 12-months, its shares have toppled close to 32%.
The Dublin headquartered firm makes up a massive 15.6% of the Patient Capital trust portfolio and is the fourth largest holding in Woodford’s £8.4bn flagship equity income fund.
Woodford currently owns the largest stake in the group at 29.52%, followed by Fidelity Management & Research, which owns a 14.86% stake.
Patience has already been wearing thin for Woodford’s long-term vehicle, with investors expressing reservations over the star manager’s sizeable stakes in Prothena, Purplebricks and other less liquid pharma and biotech stocks.
His CF Woodford Equity Income Fund has also seen its share of woes, with Aviva dumping the fund from its insurance platform and other notable investors pulling out of the vehicle.
In a year that has seen renewed optimism for the sector, Patient Capital trust has endured a series of bumps in the road, making it the second worst performing fund out of 15 funds in the UK All Companies sector, according to FE.
The trust’s net asset value (NAV) has taken a beating over the past year, currently -9.6%, compared with the sector’s average NAV of 18.4%. On a three-month view, NAV is hovering as low as -14.2%.
Woodford himself has admitted that October was “a challenging month of performance” for the trust, adding that he understands “investors may feel impatient at the lack of net asset value progression”.
As ever, he stressed the long-term nature of the investment vehicle and pointed to the “meaningful operational performance” of several of the trust’s holdings like drug developer ReNeuron and the unlisted peer-to-peer lending platform RateSetter.
