European asset manager Amundi has swooped to purchase an 87.5% stake in Kleinwort Benson’s fund arm.

The fund giant this morning announced it has signed an agreement to acquire the stake in Kleinwort Benson Investors from Oddo & Cie.

Kleinwort’s management team will acquire a 12.5% stake.

KBI, a subsidiary of BHF Kleinwort Benson Group, which was recently acquired by the Oddo group, is an equity management firm, headquartered in Dublin, Ireland with offices in Boston and New York and employing 62 people.

Its team manages 7.6 billion euros of assets as of 31 March 2016, mainly across global equity capabilities.

Sean Hawkshaw will continue as chief executive and Noel O’Halloran as chief investment officer. All employees are expected to remain with the firm.

Yves Perrier, chief executive of Amundi, said: “This acquisition is perfectly in line with Amundi’s strategy presented at the time of our recent IPO. It will strengthen our offer with a complementary and well-performing equity expertise, that will benefit our clients in Europe, Asia and the Middle-East.”

Sean Hawkshaw, chief executive of KBI, said: “Amundi is a highly regarded pure play asset manager and will be a solid long term partner for KBI.

“We believe that the combination of Amundi as a majority shareholder and a meaningful stake held by key employees offers an ideal ownership structure to continue to develop the firm while allowing us to deliver the best possible investment returns and service for our clients globally.’’

Philippe Oddo, managing partner of Oddo & Cie, said: “Amundi will provide a high-quality support both to KBI teams and to their clients, and we are
convinced that this co-operation will be successful.”

Amundi and Oddo & Cie also agreed to strengthen their cooperation via the cross selling of their investment expertise.

The transaction is subject to regulatory and client approvals, and is expected to close in the third quarter of 2016.