By Yamini Kalia and Iain Withers
LONDON (Reuters) -London-based money manager Janus Henderson said on Monday it had received a takeover proposal valuing it at $7.2 billion from billionaire Nelson Peltz's hedge fund Trian and investor General Catalyst.
Shares in the New York-listed company jumped 17% in early trading.
The investment industry has seen a wave of deals in recent years as fast-growing passive houses like BlackRock and Vanguard offering cheap index-trackers have squeezed active managers such
as Janus Henderson.
Peltz's Trian is a high-profile activist investor that attracted headlines last year after an unsuccessful bruising proxy battle for board seats at Disney.
Janus Henderson, which manages about $457 billion in assets, said it would appoint a special committee to consider the proposal, which involves the potential acquisition of all of its shares not already owned by its top shareholder Trian for $46 per share.
Trian, which already owns about a 20% stake, first invested in Janus Henderson in October 2020 and currently has two board seats. Janus Henderson said it will exclude Trian's two representatives from the review.
Trian said in a letter to Janus Henderson's board that its offer would allow shareholders to crystallise the results of a turnaround under the company's CEO Ali Dibadj and would lead to significant long-term investment. Trian declined to comment further.
The proposed offer was first reported by Bloomberg News earlier on Monday.
Janus Henderson was itself created out of the merger of Henderson Group and Janus Capital in May 2017, in a deal that initially underwhelmed investors.
(Reporting by Yamini Kalia in Bengaluru and Iain Withers in London; Editing by Krishna Chandra Eluri and Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
