IGA Classic Car Investment fund: how are they getting on?

[LotusOmega375D]

Some of you may remember this being set up by Ray Bellm, Paul Lanzante, Nick Mason et al nearly 2 years ago. They were going to raise $150 million and then hoover up 20 - 40 blue chip classics during a 3 year period purely for financial investment purposes.

Did it ever get going? I haven't heard anything about it since then.

Also at about the same time, we had the announcement of that anonymous "ROFGO" collection of exclusively Gulf Oil sponsored race cars. Is that still intact? I am sure I read somewhere about at least one of those vehicles being sold at auction.

I'm just curious to see if this concept ever took off.

[v8250]

Remember reading about IGA 2010/2011 and thinking they'll break-even at best. Go to their website and you'll see there's no updated news since Nov' 2011. Twelve months of silence? A sure sign it's a dead duck in dead water and The Team are quietly trying to sell-off and get cash back to investors...minus the fund management fees of course.

http://www.igafunds.com/press-release.html#
http://www.igafunds.com/intro.html
http://www.igafunds.com/the-team.html
http://www.igafunds.com/investment-terms.html

One has to laugh at the complete lack of credibility with these scheme types. They even state 'Illustrative Acquisitions" within the website gallery. What this really means is that we don't have any funds under management therefore we can't acquire assets which in turn means we have no growth. Would love to be proved wrong on this one.

[iSore]

The whole thing will end in tears, like it did 20 years ago.....unless of course you're one of the three stooges that set it up...

[LotusOmega375D]

Interestingly one webpage back then (January 2011) includes a quote from John Collins, the proprietor of classic Ferrari dealer Talacrest (and Chris Evans' chum). Collins stated that he too was in the process of creating a similar fund to IGA, which would be launched within two months (= March 2011). At that point he would step completely away from the dealer business, since there would then be a conflict of interest (i.e. he would be sourcing cars for the fund, rather than for his own Talacrest stock, or on behalf of his regular clients/contacts).

As far as I am aware Collins and Talacrest are very much still in the classic Ferrari dealing business. I guess he must have concluded that it remains a much better and safer way of earning a living, than via a managed fund.

I guess if you have a few million kicking about to spend on old motors, you either do a bit of research yourself as a prvate individual and buy what you want and then hope it appreciates, or pay someone like Collins to source the car(s) on your behalf.

[v8250]

LotusOmega375D said:

I guess if you have a few million kicking about to spend on old motors, you either do a bit of research yourself as a prvate individual and buy what you want and then hope it appreciates, or pay someone like Collins to source the car(s) on your behalf.

This. Why would a deep pocketed/seasoned investor pay someone as a 'Fund' to secure investment in a serious car when they could simply go to Bonhams, Talacrest, Gregor Fisken, Hall & Hall, Duncan Hamilton et al, and simply buy the car outright. They can retain the services of the above and others or even pick up the phone to Simon Kidston and ask any of these to source the 'right' car for them. As they'll be seasoned investors, and/or, have such personal wealth the chances are they won't classify their classic investments in the same way as their other long-term investments i.e., property. Those that do would generally buy with expert knowledge knowing that they won't really lose money. Inversely, there have been many cases where 'investors' go into the market for the wrong reasons, namely high forecast returns, borrow money for the acquisition and then end up losing their shirts. For some odd reason the recent Bentley case of Mrs Mercedes Brewer comes to mind...bought for £425,000, £390,000 of which was provided by Fortis Leasing...buying for greed when really she could not afford the purchase...

http://wilmotslitigation.com/#/news

...this case has already been thoroughly discussed on PH.

[Elderly]

v8250 said:

Why would a deep pocketed/seasoned investor pay someone as a 'Fund' to secure investment in a serious car ........

And - the profit (if any) made on a classic car would be CGT free because they are classed as
'Wasting Assets' but I would imagine that any profit from a 'fund' would be taxable;
an accountant should be along shortly to put me in my place if I'm wrong .