New Star bides its buying time

MAVERICK fund manager John Duffield, founder of New Star Asset Management, has shelved ambitions for a big takeover.

Duffield has weighed up two acquisitions - from fund management rivals Royal & SunAlliance (RSA) and AIB Govett. The RSA operation has about £35bn under management. Govett looks after about £9bn.

Duffield indicated last year that he was eager to expand New Star by acquisition. He was close to buying Artemis, but the deal fell apart. In the last six weeks, he has looked carefully at RSA and Govett but refused to pay their asking prices. RSA is looking for around £225-250m.

Duffield told Financial Mail: 'There seems to be an unbridgeable gap. More businesses have been offered to us in the first six weeks of this year than the whole of 2001. But the prices are wrong. We can't find anything that we want to buy at a price we are prepared to pay.'