DMX and Monash provide update as merger completes
Two Australian small-cap asset managers have completed their merger after announcing the news in July this year, while providing an investment update.
In July this year, Monash Investors announced it would be acquired by DMX Asset Management and sit within the broader DMX Group, having been in discussions since September 2023.
“The merging of our firms in this way broadens and deepens our combined investment coverage of the entire small and micro-cap space, and merging back-office functions will allow the investment team to be wholly focused on delivering for our clients in the years ahead,” a statement from Monash said at the time.
In an investor update on 11 September, the two firms confirmed that the merger has now reached completion.
DMX AM principal Michael Haddad, who manages the DMX Australian Shares Fund, has now joined the portfolio management team of Monash as a co-portfolio manager alongside Monash co-founders Simon Shields and Shane Fitzgerald.
“With the merger with DMX now complete and our teams and processes fully integrated, we reiterate the overarching attributes of the Monash fund remain the same, including its mandate, strategy and focus on owning quality smaller ASX companies with meaningful growth profiles,” Monash stated.
“We’ve been through a pivotal period in the 12-year history of Monash, and we’re excited about what the future holds, and to be delivering differentiated and value-adding portfolio exposures to our loyal investors.”
Commenting on the merger’s completion, Haddad said: “As we move into this new exciting chapter in the combined firms’ history, we want to re-double our focus into what’s really moved the needle over time.”
In particular, he said the firm is focused on the identification and long-term ownership of attractive, smaller ASX-listed companies that have “a significant growth runway ahead”.
“The ASX is populated by many hundreds of interesting smaller companies, with the holy grail being those small growing companies that can be acquired at reasonable prices. Capturing both their growth, plus eventual multiple re-rate as others cotton-on, can lead to exceptional returns,” Haddad added.
Monash Investors was set up in 2012 and runs a Small Companies Fund, while DMX AM was founded in 2015 and runs an unlisted DMX Capital Partners and a wholesale DMX Australian Shares Fund, managing around $37 million.
AUTHOR
Jasmine Siljic
Recommended for you
Tribeca Investment Partners has made a distribution hire from Australian Ethical in a newly-created role focused on the national intermediary market.
Asset managers may be urged to diversify their product ranges, but investment executives have warned any M&A deal should avoid simply filling gaps and instead consider long-term value creation.
Specialist wealth platform provider Mason Stevens has become the latest target of an acquisition as it enters a binding agreement with a leading Sydney-based private equity firm.
Fund managers are entering 2025 with the most bullish sentiment since August 2021 and record high allocations to US equities, thanks to the incoming Trump administration.
