Matthew Howard is to succeed Peter Lowe as BMO Real Estate Investments’ lead manager.
Howard, who joined BMO Real Estate Partners in 2017 from Hermes Investment Management, now Federated Hermes, will take on the role from 19 July. He is a member of BMO REP’s investment committee as well as fund manager of the RSA Shareholders Real Estate Fund and deputy manager of BMO Commercial Property Trust.
Due to the change, chair Vikram Lall is postponing stepping down. On 31 March the company announced that Lall would be stepping down from the board later this year.
In a statement this morning, it said: “In light of the change in lead manager and retirement of Rebecca Gates as a director, the board feel it would be appropriate for Vikram to continue as chairman beyond this period to ensure a smooth transition of responsibilities and provide continuity for shareholders.”
It added that a process to find Gates’ replacement has commenced and an update will be provided in due course.
Lall said: “We are delighted that Matthew will take on the role as our lead manager and look forward to working with Matthew on building on our impressive NAV performance track record. We continue to believe the company’s share price is not reflective of value and quality of portfolio. The board are addressing the fact that the shareholder returns do not match the performance of the portfolio.”
BMO’s share price is currently 94.50, giving it a market cap of £226m, a discount of 22.4% to NAV. Its portfolio was last valued at £391m.
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