A little known Finnish fund manager has been picked to succeed Anthony Bolton in running one of the two successor funds to his spectacularly successful £6 billion Fidelity Special Situations Fund.
Jorma Korhonen, 40, was today named by Fidelity to manage a global fund that will be created out of Special Situations, Britain’s best-performing retail fund over the long term.
The appointment is a dramatic elevation for Mr Korhonen, who currently runs two small Fidelity funds for Japanese and Australian retail investors with a combined value of just $200 million.
Fidelity is breaking up Special Situations into two smaller funds. One will continue to be managed by Mr Bolton until the end of next year with the same UK focus as the existing fund.
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The other will be run by Mr Korhonen from the beginning of next year and will be free to invest in equities anywhere in the world.
Both funds plan to take advantage of new rules allowing funds to bet on falling share prices by investing in so-called contracts for difference, or CFDs, Fidelity also revealed.
The decision to pick Mr Korhonen surprised financial advisers, who had expected more established Fidelity managers such as Tim McCarron or Sanjeev Shah to be given the plum job.
Mr Bolton said: “Jorma was my pick. When you work with somebody for ten years, you know whether someone’s got it.”
Mr Korhonen, who was born in Helsinki and educated in Switzerland and Germany, joined Fidelity as an analyst ten years ago. Before that he worked as a commercial banker for Dai Ichi Kangyo Bank in Luxembourg. He has an MBA from IMD business school in Lausanne, Switzerland.
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Mr Korhonen said he would continue with some of Mr Bolton’s investment styles, including being contrarian and seeking out recognised value.
The 250,000 investors in Special Situations have the chance to vote on the split and the CFD approach on July 27. The resolutions require 75 per cent of the votes cast.
Mr Bolton acquired the nickname of The Quiet Assassin after leading a shareholder revolt to topple Michael Green of Carlton Communications.