History
Camlin Asset Management is a Vancouver, Canada based investment management firm. Camlin was spun out in 2004 from its predecessor investment banking firm and has a collective track record as a specialty fund manager dating back to March 2000. Our first client was Investors Group, a sub-advisory relationship that we still value today.
Catalyst-driven Investment Approach
"Catalyst" is a term used to describe entrepeneurs or companies who initiative a fundamental change in a business. Our team identifies these future changes through the synthesis of both traditional and non-traditional information. This may include factors such as:
- a company taking a major restructuring charge;
- a company selling "non-core" assets;
- the emergence of motivated or activists shareholders;
- regulator changes in a company's area of business
Camlin has coined the term "second pay-day" to describe our catalyst-driven investment approach. This two-stage process is at the heart of all that we do.
First Pay-day
Each client owns a portfolio of growth-oriented franchies, primarily small to mid-sized companies from industries experiencing positive long-term consolidation trends. These companies tend to receve little press and are largely ignored by mainstream investment houses.
Company sales, market share, revenues and production are all analyzed for growth potential. In addition, our team examines investment opportunities from a strategic perspective. Each company considered for portfolio inclusion must:
- be well managed and successfully executing their business plan;
- have strategic value to other firms in its sector, such as resource enhancement, geographic expansion, or product line acquisition;
- be trading at a discount to this strategic value
Second Pay-day
Identification of potential acquisition targets is the key to the second stage of our process. The companies with the most catalyst potential make it into our clients' portfolios, and these investments are monitored until their strategic value is realized through price appreciation or acquisition.
Globalization, low interest rates, the growth of private equity and sovereign wealth funds, and the strategic redeployment of strong corporate balance sheets all provide an exciting environment for the continued success of our unique approach to managing investor assets.
Portfolio Management Team
Camlin founder John Campbell, CFA, MBA, leads the portfolio management team. He has 25 years of experience in the investment industry which includes co-founding investment banking firm CWC Capital, working as a mergers and acquisitions specialist with The Jim Pattison Group and acting as a portfolio manager and securities analyst at a regional brokerage firm.
Portfolio Manager John Gariepy, CFA, MBA, joined Camlin in 2002, and leads coverage on Basic Materials. He spent the previous seven years as a senior treasury analyst at West Coast Energy, where he developed expertise in credit management, corporate debt and equity funding, and pension investment.
Portfolion Manager Guy Wildeman, CFA, focuses on "global oil," and has expertise in portfolio construction, valuation, sector strategy and hedging. He joined Camlin in 2006 after nearly nine years with Genus Capital Management.
Analyst Jay Yap, MBA, covers the financial and "clear tech" sectors for Camlin. He joined the firm in 2005 after eleven years with a life insurance company in Malaysia.
Junior Analyst Jack James manages the office and provides research and insight into the technology sector.