Financial news

Chrysalis, a £1bn trust founded in 2018, is a significant investor in technology-heavy stocks such as payments firm Klarna and challenger bank Starling.

Overseen by Jupiter fund managers Richard Watts and Nick Williamson, the duo received a windfall of some £60m between them last year, out of a total of £117m in performance and management fees.

But in a radical revamp to its pay structure, performance fees above a high-water mark have been cut by 7.5 percentage points to 12.5%, and will be paid entirely in shares.

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Jupiter will no longer receive awards in the new structure — just Chrysalis’ management team.

Performance fees will also be subject to a three-to-five year lock-in period, with only 25% of the shares immediately available and the rest dependent on share price movements.

The fund’s total expense ratio — a measure of overall costs to investors — will be capped at 3.75%, also limiting the performance payouts that can be made in any one year.

Shareholders will now vote on the changes, which will come into force from the start of the financial year if approved.

While investments in unicorns had seen the trust prosper in previous years, the market rout of 2022 has piled pressure on asset managers across the industry to cut costs.

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To contact the author of this story with feedback or news, email Justin Cash