Eika funds and private investor Peter Hermanrud had a fire sale of salmon shares – just in the nick of time.
The asset manager Eika-fondene sold shares in Mowi and SalMar worth a total of NOK 286 million (€28.6 million) on Monday this week – two days before it became public knowledge that the government is introducing a 40 percent resource rent tax for aquaculture.
Investment director Gaute Eie at Eika Kapitalforvaltning would not comment on the share sale to Finansavisen.
Another who displayed astonishing flair and timing before the tax package was former chief strategist at First Securities and Sparebank 1 Markets, now private investor Peter Hermanrud. He sold all his 65,000 Lerøy shares, worth 4.3 million NOK (€0.4 million) on Tuesday.
Hermanrud does not hide that the sale was motivated by a possible salmon tax.
“I didn’t know anything about it coming, but I guessed it. There was, among other things, an editorial in both DN and VG about it the day before yesterday, and it is clear that the lobby on both sides came up with various proposals. Then the Ministry of Finance called a press conference yesterday, which was to be held before the stock market opened, but would not say what it was about. At the time I thought that this was stock market sensitive and that this was perhaps resource rent tax on aquaculture,” Hermanrud told Finansavisen.
On Wednesday, after the government had finally officially released the information about a proposed resource rent tax of a whopping 40 percent, share prices were devastated. During the day, stock market values of an incredible NOK 55.9 billion (€5.6 billion) were washed away.
